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THE PARISIANS

By Edward Bulwer-Lytton

PREFATORY NOTE.

(BY THE AUTHOR'S SON.)

"The Parisians" and "Kenelm Chillingly" were begun about the same time,
and had their common origin in the same central idea. That idea first
found fantastic expression in "The Coming Race;" and the three books,
taken together, constitute a special group, distinctly apart from all the
other works of their author.

The satire of his earlier novels is a protest against false social
respectabilities; the humour of his later ones is a protest against the
disrespect of social realities. By the first he sought to promote social
sincerity and the free play of personal character; by the last, to
encourage mutual charity and sympathy amongst all classes, on whose
interrelation depends the character of society itself. But in these
three books, his latest fictions, the moral purpose is more definite and
exclusive. Each of them is an expostulation against what seemed to him
the perilous popularity of certain social and political theories, or a
warning against the influence of certain intellectual tendencies upon
individual character and national life. This purpose, however, though
common to the three fictions, is worked out in each of them by a
different method. "The Coming Race" is a work of pure fancy, and the
satire of it is vague and sportive. The outlines of a definite purpose
are more distinctly drawn in "Chillingly,"--a romance which has the
source of its effect in a highly wrought imagination. The humour and
pathos of "Chillingly" are of a kind incompatible with the design of "The
Parisians," which is a work of dramatized observation. "Chillingly" is a
romance; "The Parisians" is a novel. The subject of "Chillingly" is
psychological; that of "The Parisians" is social. The author's object
in "Chillingly" being to illustrate the effects of "modern ideas" upon
an individual character, he has confined his narrative to the biography
of that one character; hence the simplicity of plot and small number of
dramatis personae, whereby the work gains in height and depth what it
loses in breadth of surface. "The Parisians," on the contrary, is
designed to illustrate the effect of "modern ideas" upon a whole
community. This novel is therefore panoramic in the profusion and
variety of figures presented by it to the reader's imagination. No
exclusive prominence is vouchsafed to any of these figures. All of them
are drawn and coloured with an equal care, but by means of the bold,
broad touches necessary for their effective presentation on a canvas so
large and so crowded. Such figures are, indeed, but the component
features of one great form, and their actions only so many modes of one
collective impersonal character,--that of the Parisian Society of
Imperial and Democratic France; a character everywhere present and busy
throughout the story, of which it is the real hero or heroine. This
society was doubtless selected for characteristic illustration as being
the most advanced in the progress of "modern ideas." Thus, for a
complete perception of its writer's fundamental purpose, "The Parisians"
should be read in connection with "Chillingly," and these two books in
connection with "The Coming Race." It will then be perceived that
through the medium of alternate fancy, sentiment, and observation,
assisted by humour and passion, these three books (in all other respects
so different from each other) complete the presentation of the same
purpose under different aspects, and thereby constitute a group of
fictions which claims a separate place of its own in any thoughtful
classification of their author's works.

One last word to those who will miss from these pages the connecting and
completing touches of the master's hand. It may be hoped that such a
disadvantage, though irreparable, is somewhat mitigated by the essential
character of the work itself. The aesthetic merit of this kind of novel
is in the vivacity of a general effect produced by large, swift strokes
of character; and in such strokes, if they be by a great artist, force
and freedom of style must still be apparent, even when they are left
rough and unfinished. Nor can any lack of final verbal correction much
diminish the intellectual value which many of the more thoughtful
passages of the present work derive from a long, keen, and practical
study of political phenomena, guided by personal experience of public
life, and enlightened by a large, instinctive knowledge of the human
heart.

Such a belief is, at least, encouraged by the private communications
spontaneously made to him who expresses it, by persons of political
experience and social position in France, who have acknowledged the
general accuracy of the author's descriptions, and noticed the suggestive
sagacity and penetration of his occasional comments on the circumstances
and sentiments he describes.

INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER.

They who chance to have read the "Coming Race" may perhaps remember that
I, the adventurous discoverer of the land without a sun, concluded the
sketch of my adventures by a brief reference to the malady which, though
giving no perceptible notice of its encroachments, might, in the opinion
of my medical attendant, prove suddenly fatal.

I had brought my little book to this somewhat melancholy close a few
years before the date of its publication, and in the meanwhile I was
induced to transfer my residence to Paris, in order to place myself under
the care of an English physician, renowned for his successful treatment
of complaints analogous to my own.

I was the more readily persuaded to undertake this journey,--partly
because I enjoyed a familiar acquaintance with the eminent physician
referred to, who had commenced his career and founded his reputation in
the United States; partly because I had become a solitary man, the ties
of home broken, and dear friends of mine were domiciled in Paris, with
whom I should be sure of tender sympathy and cheerful companionship. I
had reason to be thankful for this change of residence: the skill of Dr.
C_____ soon restored me to health. Brought much into contact with
various circles of Parisian society, I became acquainted with the persons
and a witness of the events that form the substance of the tale I am
about to submit to the public, which has treated my former book with so
generous an indulgence. Sensitively tenacious of that character for
strict and unalloyed veracity which, I flatter myself, my account of the
abodes and manners of the Vril-ya has established, I could have wished to
preserve the following narrative no less jealously guarded than its
predecessor from the vagaries of fancy. But Truth undisguised, never
welcome in any civilized community above ground, is exposed at this time
to especial dangers in Paris; and my life would not be worth an hour's
purchase if I exhibited her 'in puris naturalibus' to the eyes of a
people wholly unfamiliarized to a spectacle so indecorous. That care
for one's personal safety which is the first duty of thoughtful man
compels me therefore to reconcile the appearance of 'la Verite' to the
'bienseances' of the polished society in which 'la Liberte' admits no
opinion not dressed after the last fashion.

Attired as fiction, Truth may be peacefully received; and, despite the
necessity thus imposed by prudence, I indulge the modest hope that I do
not in these pages unfaithfully represent certain prominent types of the
brilliant population which has invented so many varieties of Koom-Posh;

[Koom-Posh, Glek-Nas. For the derivation of these terms and their
metaphorical signification, I must refer the reader to the "Coming
Race," chapter xii., on the language of the Vril-ya. To those who
have not read or have forgotten that historical composition, it may
be convenient to state briefly that Koom-Posh with the Vril-ya is
the name for the government of the many, or the ascendency of the
most ignorant or hollow, and may be loosely rendered Hollow-Bosh.
When Koom-Posh degenerates from popular ignorance into the popular
ferocity which precedes its decease, the name for that state of
things is Glek-Nas; namely, the universal strife-rot.]

and even when it appears hopelessly lost in the slough of a Glek-Nas,
re-emerges fresh and lively as if from an invigorating plunge into the
Fountain of Youth. O Paris, 'foyer des idees, et oeil du monde!'--
animated contrast to the serene tranquillity of the Vril-ya, which,
nevertheless, thy noisiest philosophers ever pretend to make the goal
of their desires: of all communities on which shines the sun and descend
the rains of heaven, fertilizing alike wisdom and folly, virtue and vice;
in every city men have yet built on this earth,--mayest thou, O Paris, be
the last to brave the wands of the Coming Race and be reduced into
cinders for the sake of the common good!
TISH.

PARIS, August 28, 1872.

THE PARISIANS.

BOOK I.

CHAPTER I.

It was a bright day in the early spring of 1869. All Paris seemed to
have turned out to enjoy itself. The Tuileries, the Champs Elysees, the
Bois de Boulogne, swarmed with idlers. A stranger might have wondered
where Toil was at work, and in what nook Poverty lurked concealed.
A millionaire from the London Exchange, as he looked round on the
magasins, the equipages, the dresses of the women; as he inquired the
prices in the shops and the rent of apartments,--might have asked
himself, in envious wonder, How on earth do those gay Parisians live?
What is their fortune? Where does it come from?

As the day declined, many of the scattered loungers crowded into the
Boulevards; the cafes and restaurants began to light up.

About this time a young man, who might be some five or six and twenty,
was walking along the Boulevard des Italiens, heeding little the throng
through which he glided his solitary way: there was that in his aspect
and bearing which caught attention. He looked a somebody; but though
unmistakably a Frenchman, not a Parisian. His dress was not in the
prevailing mode: to a practised eye it betrayed the taste and the cut
of a provincial tailor. His gait was not that of the Parisian,--less
lounging, more stately; and, unlike the Parisian, he seemed indifferent
to the gaze of others.

Nevertheless there was about him that air of dignity or distinction which
those who are reared from their cradle in the pride of birth acquire so
unconsciously that it seems hereditary and inborn. It must also be
confessed that the young man himself was endowed with a considerable
share of that nobility which Nature capriciously distributes among her
favourites with little respect for their pedigree and blazon, the
nobility of form and face. He was tall and well shaped, with graceful
length of limb and fall of shoulders; his face was handsome, of the
purest type of French masculine beauty,--the nose inclined to be
aquiline, and delicately thin, with finely-cut open nostrils; the
complexion clear,--the eyes large, of a light hazel, with dark lashes,
--the hair of a chestnut brown, with no tint of auburn,--the beard and
mustache a shade darker, clipped short, not disguising the outline of
lips, which were now compressed, as if smiles had of late been unfamiliar
to them; yet such compression did not seem in harmony with the
physiognomical character of their formation, which was that assigned
by Lavater to temperaments easily moved to gayety and pleasure.

Another man, about his own age, coming quickly out of one of the streets
of the Chausee d'Antin, brushed close by the stately pedestrian above
described, caught sight of his countenance, stopped short, and exclaimed,
"Alain!" The person thus abruptly accosted turned his eye tranquilly on
the eager face, of which all the lower part was enveloped in black beard;
and slightly lifting his hat, with a gesture of the head that implied,
"Sir, you are mistaken; I have not the honour to know you," continued his
slow indifferent way. The would-be acquaintance was not so easily
rebuffed. "Peste," he said, between his teeth, "I am certainly right.
He is not much altered: of course I AM; ten years of Paris would improve
an orang-outang." Quickening his step, and regaining the side of the man
he had called "Alain," he said, with a well-bred mixture of boldness and
courtesy in his tone and countenance,

"Ten thousand pardons if I am wrong. Put surely I accost Alain de
Kerouec, son of the Marquis de Rochebriant."

"True, sir; but--"

"But you do not remember me, your old college friend, Frederic
Lemercier?"

"Is it possibly?" cried Alain, cordially, and with an animation which
charged the whole character of his countenance. "My dear Frederic, my
dear friend, this is indeed good fortune! So you, too, are at Paris?"

"Of course; and you? Just come, I perceive," he added, somewhat
satirically, as, linking his arm in his new-found friend's, he glanced at
the cut of that friend's coat-collar.

"I have been herd a fortnight," replied Alain.

"Hem! I suppose you lodge in the old Hotel de Rochebriant. I passed it
yesterday, admiring its vast facade, little thinking you were its
inmate."

"Neither am I; the hotel does not belong to me; it was sold some years
ago by my father."

"Indeed! I hope your father got a good price for it; those grand hotels
have trebled their value within the last five years. And how is your
father? Still the same polished grand seigneur? I never saw him but
once, you know; and I shall never forget his smile, style grand monarque,
when he patted me on the head and tipped me ten napoleons."

"My father is no more," said Alain, gravely; "he has been dead nearly
three years."

"Ciel! forgive me; I am greatly shocked. Hem! so you are now the
Marquis de Rochebriant, a great historical name, worth a large sum in the
market. Few such names left. Superb place your old chateau, is it not?"

"A superb place, no--a venerable ruin, yes!"

"Ah, a ruin! so much the better. All the bankers are mad after ruins: so
charming an amusement to restore them. You will restore yours, without
doubt. I will introduce you to such an architect! has the 'moyen age' at
his fingers' ends. Dear,--but a genius."

The young Marquis smiled,--for since he had found a college friend, his
face showed that it could smile,--smiled, but not cheerfully, and
answered,

"I have no intention to restore Rochebriant. The walls are solid: they
have weathered the storms of six centuries, they will last my time, and
with me the race perishes."

"Bah! the race perish, indeed! you will marry. 'Parlez moi de ca': you
could not come to a better man. I have a list of all the heiresses at
Paris, bound in russia leather. You may take your choice out of twenty.
Ah, if I were but a Rochebriant! It is an infernal thing to come into
the world a Lemercier. I am a democrat, of course. A Lemercier would be
in a false position if he were not. But if any one would leave me twenty
acres of land, with some antique right to the De and a title, faith,
would not I be an aristocrat, and stand up for my order? But now we have
met, pray let us dine together. Ah! no doubt you are engaged every day
for a month. A Rochebriant just new to Paris must be 'fete' by all the
Faubourg."

"No," answered Alain, simply, "I am not engaged; my range of acquaintance
is more circumscribed than you suppose."

"So much the better for me. I am luckily disengaged today, which is not
often the case, for I am in some request in my own set, though it is not
that of the Faubourg. Where shall we dine?--at the Trois Freres?"

"Wherever you please. I know no restaurant at Paris, except a very
ignoble one, close by my lodging."

"'Apropos', where do you lodge?" "Rue de l'Universite, Numero ___."

"A fine street, but 'triste'. If you have no longer your family hotel,
you have no excuse to linger in that museum of mummies, the Faubourg St.
Germain; you must go into one of the new quarters by the Champs Elysees.
Leave it to me; I'll find you a charming apartment. I know one to be had
a bargain,--a bagatelle,--five hundred naps a-year. Cost you about two
or three thousand more to furnish tolerably, not showily. Leave all to
me. In three days you shall be settled. Apropos! horses! You must have
English ones. How many?--three for the saddle, two for your 'coupe'?
I'll find them for you. I will write to London to-morrow: Reese [Rice]
is your man."

"Spare yourself that trouble, my dear Frederic. I keep no horses and no
coupe. I shall not change my apartment." As he said this, Rochebriant
drew himself up somewhat haughtily.

"Faith," thought Lemercier, "is it possible that the Marquis is poor?
No. I have always heard that the Rochebriants were among the greatest
proprietors in Bretagne. Most likely, with all his innocence of the
Faubourg St. Germain, he knows enough of it to be aware that I, Frederic
Lemercier, am not the man to patronize one of its greatest nobles.
'Sacre bleu!' if I thought that; if he meant to give himself airs to me,
his old college friend,--I would--I would call him out."

Just as M. Lemercier had come to that bellicose resolution, the Marquis
said, with a smile which, though frank, was not without a certain grave
melancholy in its expression, "My dear Frederic, pardon me if I seem to
receive your friendly offers ungraciously. But I believe that I have.
reasons you will approve for leading at Paris a life which you certainly
will not envy;" then, evidently desirous to change the subject, he said
in a livelier tone, "But what a marvellous city this Paris of ours is!
Remember I had never seen it before: it burst on me like a city in the
Arabian Nights two weeks ago. And that which strikes me most--I say it
with regret and a pang of conscience--is certainly not the Paris of
former times, but that Paris which M. Buonaparte--I beg pardon, which the
Emperor--has called up around him, and identified forever with his reign.
It is what is new in Paris that strikes and enthrals me. Here I see the
life of France, and I belong to her tombs!"

"I don't quite understand you," said Lemercier. "If you think that
because your father and grandfather were Legitimists, you have not the
fair field of living ambition open to you under the Empire, you never
were more mistaken. 'Moyen age,' and even rococo, are all the rage.
You have no idea how valuable your name would be either at the Imperial
Court or in a Commercial Company. But with your fortune you are
independent of all but fashion and the Jockey Club.

"And 'apropos' of that, pardon me,--what villain made your coat?--let me
know; I will denounce him to the police." Half amused, half amazed,
Alain Marquis de Rochebriant looked at Frederic Lemercier much as a good-
tempered lion may look upon a lively poodle who takes a liberty with his
mane, and after a pause he replied curtly, "The clothes I wear at Paris
were made in Bretagne; and if the name of Rochebriant be of any value at
all in Paris, which I doubt, let me trust that it will make me
acknowledged as 'gentilhomme,' whatever my taste in a coat or whatever
the doctrines of a club composed--of jockeys."

"Ha, ha!" cried Lemercier, freeing himself from the arm of his friend,
and laughing the more irresistibly as he encountered the grave look of
the Marquis. "Pardon me,--I can't help it,--the Jockey Club,--composed
of jockeys!--it is too much!--the best joke. My dear, Alain, there is
some of the best blood of Europe in the Jockey Club; they would exclude
a plain bourgeois like me. But it is all the same: in one respect you
are quite right. Walk in a blouse if you please: you are still
Rochebriant; you would only be called eccentric. Alas! I am obliged to
send to London for my pantaloons: that comes of being a Lemercier. But
here we are in the Palais Royal."

CHAPTER II.

The salons of the Trois Freres were crowded; our friends found a table
with some little difficulty. Lemercier proposed a private cabinet,
which, for some reason known to himself, the Marquis declined.

Lemercier spontaneously and unrequested ordered the dinner and the wines.

While waiting for their oysters, with which, when in season, French 'bon-
vivants' usually commence their dinner, Lemercier looked round the salon
with that air of inimitable, scrutinizing, superb impertinence which
distinguishes the Parisian dandy. Some of the ladies returned his glance
coquettishly, for Lemercier was 'beau garcon;' others turned aside
indignantly, and muttered something to the gentlemen dining with them.
The said gentlemen, when old, shook their heads, and continued to eat
unmoved; when young, turned briskly round, and looked at first fiercely
at M. Lemercier, but, encountering his eye through the glass which he had
screwed into his socket, noticing the hardihood of his countenance and
the squareness of his shoulders, even they turned back to the tables,
shook their heads, and continued to eat unmoved, just like the old ones.

"Ah!" cried Lemercier, suddenly, "here comes a man you should know, 'mon
cher.' He will tell you how to place your money,--a rising man, a coming
man, a future minister. Ah! 'bon jour,' Duplessis, 'bon jour,'" kissing
his hand to a gentleman who had just entered and was looking about him
for a seat. He was evidently well and favourably known at the Trois
Freres. The waiters had flocked round him, and were pointing to a table
by the window, which a saturnine Englishman, who had dined off a
beefsteak and potatoes, was about to vacate.

M. Duplessis, having first assured himself, like a prudent man, that his
table was secure, having ordered his oysters, his chablis, and his
'potage a la bisque,' now paced calmly and slowly across the salon, and
halted before Lemercier.

Here let me pause for a moment, and give the reader a rapid sketch of the
two Parisians.

Frederic Lemercier is dressed, somewhat too showily, in the extreme of
the prevalent fashion. He wears a superb pin in his cravat,--a pin worth
two thousand francs; he wears rings on his fingers, 'breloques' to his
watch-chain. He has a warm though dark complexion, thick black eyebrows,
full lips, a nose somewhat turned up, but not small, very fine large dark
eyes, a bold, open, somewhat impertinent expression of countenance;
withal decidedly handsome, thanks to colouring, youth, and vivacity of
regard.

Lucien Duplessis, bending over the table, glancing first with curiosity
at the Marquis de Rochebriant, who leans his cheek on his hand and seems
not to notice him, then concentrating his attention on Frederic
Lemercier, who sits square with his hands clasped,--Lucien Duplessis
is somewhere between forty and fifty, rather below the middle height,
slender, but not slight,--what in English phrase is called "wiry."
He is dressed with extreme simplicity: black frockcoat buttoned up; black
cravat worn higher than men who follow the fashions wear their neckcloths
nowadays; a hawk's eye and a hawk's beak; hair of a dull brown, very
short, and wholly without curl; his cheeks thin and smoothly shaven,
but he wears a mustache and imperial, plagiarized from those of his
sovereign, and, like all plagiarisms, carrying the borrowed beauty to
extremes, so that the points of mustache and imperial, stiffened and
sharpened by cosmetics which must have been composed of iron, looked like
three long stings guarding lip and jaw from invasion; a pale olive-brown
complexion, eyes small, deep-sunk, calm, piercing; his expression of face
at first glance not striking, except for quiet immovability. Observed
more heedfully, the expression was keenly intellectual,--determined about
the lips, calculating about the brows: altogether the face of no ordinary
man, and one not, perhaps, without fine and high qualities, concealed
from the general gaze by habitual reserve, but justifying the confidence
of those whom he admitted into his intimacy.

"Ah, mon cher," said Lemercier, "you promised to call on me yesterday at
two o'clock. I waited in for you half an hour; you never came."

"No; I went first to the Bourse. The shares in that Company we spoke of
have fallen; they will fall much lower: foolish to buy in yet; so the
object of my calling on you was over. I took it for granted you would
not wait if I failed my appointment. Do you go to the opera to-night?"

"I think not; nothing worth going for: besides, I have found an old
friend, to whom I consecrate this evening. Let me introduce you to the
Marquis de Rochebriant. Alain, M. Duplessis."

The two gentlemen bowed.

"I had the honour to be known to Monsieur your father," said Duplessis.

"Indeed," returned Rochebriant. "He had not visited Paris for many years
before he died."

"It was in London I met him, at the house of the Russian Princess C____."

The Marquis coloured high, inclined his head gravely, and made no reply.
Here the waiter brought the oysters and the chablis, and Duplessis
retired to his own table.

"That is the most extraordinary man," said Frederic, as he squeezed the
lemon over his oysters, "and very much to be admired."

"How so? I see nothing at least to admire in his face," said the
Marquis, with the bluntness of a provincial.

"His face. Ah! you are a Legitimist,--party prejudice. He dresses his
face after the Emperor; in itself a very clever face, surely."

"Perhaps, but not an amiable one. He looks like a bird of prey."

"All clever men are birds of prey. The eagles are the heroes, and the
owls the sages. Duplessis is not an eagle nor an owl. I should rather
call him a falcon, except that I would not attempt to hoodwink him."

"Call him what you will," said the Marquis, indifferently; "M. Duplessis
can be nothing to me."

"I am not so sure of that," answered Frederic, somewhat nettled by the
phlegm with which the Provincial regarded the pretensions of the
Parisian. "Duplessis, I repeat it, is an extraordinary man. Though
untitled, he descends from your old aristocracy; in fact, I believe,
as his name shows, from the same stem as the Richelieus. His father was
a great scholar, and I believe be has read much himself. Might have
distinguished himself in literature or at the bar, but his parents died
fearfully poor; and some distant relations in commerce took charge of
him, and devoted his talents to the 'Bourse.' Seven years ago he lived
in a single chamber, 'au quatrieme,' near the Luxembourg. He has now a
hotel, not large but charming, in the Champs Elysees, worth at least six
hundred thousand francs. Nor has he made his own fortune alone, but that
of many others; some of birth as high as your own. He has the genius of
riches, and knocks off a million as a poet does an ode, by the force of
inspiration. He is hand-in-glove with the Ministers, and has been
invited to Compiegne by the Emperor. You will find him very useful."

Alain made a slight movement of incredulous dissent, and changed the
conversation to reminiscences of old school-boy days.

The dinner at length came to a close. Frederic rang for the bill,--
glanced over it. "Fifty-nine francs," said he, carelessly flinging down
his napoleon and a half. The Marquis silently drew forth his purse and
extracted the same sum. When they were out of the restaurant, Frederic
proposed adjourning to his own rooms. "I can promise you an excellent
cigar, one of a box given to me by an invaluable young Spaniard attached
to the Embassy here. Such cigars are not to be had at Paris for money,
nor even for love; seeing that women, however devoted and generous, never
offer you anything better than a cigarette. Such cigars are only to be
had for friendship. Friendship is a jewel."

"I never smoke," answered the Marquis, "but I shall be charmed to come to
your rooms; only don't let me encroach on your good-nature. Doubtless
you have engagements for the evening."

"None till eleven o'clock, when I have promised to go to a soiree to
which I do not offer to take you; for it is one of those Bohemian
entertainments at which it would do you harm in the Faubourg to assist,
--at least until you have made good your position. Let me see, is not
the Duchesse de Tarascon a relation of yours?"

"Yes; my poor mother's first cousin."

"I congratulate you. 'Tres grande dame.' She will launch you in 'puro
coelo,' as Juno might have launched one of her young peacocks."

"There has been no acquaintance between our houses," returned the
Marquis, dryly, "since the mesalliance of her second nuptials."

"Mesalliance! second nuptials! Her second husband was the Duc de
Tarascon."

"A duke of the First Empire, the grandson of a butcher."

"Diable! you are a severe genealogist, Monsieur le Marquis. How can
you consent to walk arm-in-arm with me, whose great-grandfather supplied
bread to the same army to which the Due de Tarascon's grandfather
furnished the meat?"

"My dear Frederic, we two have an equal pedigree, for our friendship
dates from the same hour. I do not blame the Duchesse de Tarascon for
marrying the grandson of a butcher, but for marrying the son of a man
made duke by a usurper. She abandoned the faith of her house and the
cause of her sovereign. Therefore her marriage is a blot on our
scutcheon."

Frederic raised his eyebrows, but had the tact to pursue the subject
no further. He who interferes in the quarrels of relations must pass
through life without a friend.

The young men now arrived at Lemercier's apartment, an entresol looking
on the Boulevard des Italiens, consisting of more rooms than a bachelor
generally requires; low-pitched, indeed, but of good dimensions, and
decorated and furnished with a luxury which really astonished the
provincial, though, with the high-bred pride of an oriental, he
suppressed every sign of surprise.

Florentine cabinets, freshly retouched by the exquisite skill of Mombro;
costly specimens of old Sevres and Limoges; pictures and bronzes and
marble statuettes,--all well chosen and of great price, reflected from
mirrors in Venetian frames,--made a 'coup d'oeil' very favourable to that
respect which the human mind pays to the evidences of money. Nor was
comfort less studied than splendour. Thick carpets covered the floors,
doubled and quilted portieres excluded all draughts from chinks in the
doors. Having allowed his friend a few minutes to contemplate and admire
the 'salle a manger' and 'salon' which constituted his more state
apartments, Frederic then conducted him into a small cabinet, fitted up
with scarlet cloth and gold fringes, whereon were artistically arranged
trophies of Eastern weapons and Turkish pipes with amber mouthpieces.

There, placing the Marquis at ease on a divan and flinging himself on
another, the Parisian exquisite ordered a valet, well dressed as himself,
to bring coffee and liqueurs; and after vainly pressing one of his
matchless cigars on his friend, indulged in his own Regalia.

"They are ten years old," said Frederic, with a tone of compassion at
Alain's self-inflicted loss,--"ten years old. Born therefore about the
year in which we two parted--"

"When you were so hastily summoned from college," said the Marquis, "by
the news of your father's illness. We expected you back in vain. Have
you been at Paris ever since?"

"Ever since; my poor father died of that illness. His fortune proved
much larger than was suspected: my share amounted to an income from
investments in stocks, houses, etc., to upwards of sixty thousand francs
a-year; and as I wanted six years to my majority of course the capital on
attaining my majority would be increased by accumulation. My mother
desired to keep me near her; my uncle, who was joint guardian with her,
looked with disdain on our poor little provincial cottage; so promising
an heir should acquire his finishing education under masters at Paris.
Long before I was of age, I was initiated into politer mysteries of our
capital than those celebrated by Eugene Sue. When I took possession of
my fortune five years ago, I was considered a Croesus; and really for
that patriarchal time I was wealthy. Now, alas! my accumulations have
vanished in my outfit; and sixty thousand francs a-year is the least a
Parisian can live upon. It is not only that all prices have fabulously
increased, but that the dearer things become, the better people live.
When I first came out, the world speculated upon me; now, in order to
keep my standing, I am forced to speculate on the world. Hitherto I have
not lost; Duplessis let me into a few good things this year, worth one
hundred thousand francs or so. Croesus consulted the Delphic Oracle.
Duplessis was not alive in the time of Croesus, or Croesus would have
consulted Duplessis."

Here there was a ring at the outer door of the apartment, and in another
minute the valet ushered in a gentleman somewhere about the age of
thirty, of prepossessing countenance, and with the indefinable air of
good-breeding and 'usage du monde.' Frederic started up to greet
cordially the new-comer, and introduced him to the Marquis under the name
of "Sare Grarm Varn."

"Decidedly," said the visitor, as he took off his paletot and seated
himself beside the Marquis,--"decidedly, my dear Lemercier," said he, in
very correct French, and with the true Parisian accent and intonation,
"you Frenchmen merit that praise for polished ignorance of the language
of barbarians which a distinguished historian bestows on the ancient
Romans. Permit me, Marquis, to submit to you the consideration whether
Grarm Varn is a fair rendering of my name as truthfully printed on this
card."

The inscription on the card, thus drawn from its case and placed in
Alain's hand, was--

MR. GRAHAM VANE,

No. __ Rue d'Anjou.

The Marquis gazed at it as he might on a hieroglyphic, and passed it on
to Lemercier in discreet silence.

That gentleman made another attempt at the barbarian appellation.

"'Grar--ham Varne.' 'C'est ca!' I triumph! all difficulties yield to
French energy."

Here the coffee and liqueurs were served; and after a short pause the
Englishman, who had very quietly been observing the silent Marquis,
turned to him and said, "Monsieur le Marquis, I presume it was your
father whom I remember as an acquaintance of my own father at Ems.
It is many years ago; I was but a child. The Count de Chambord was then
at that enervating little spa for the benefit of the Countess's health.
If our friend Lemercier does not mangle your name as he does mine, I
understand him to say that you are the Marquis de Rochebriant."

"That is my name: it pleases me to hear that my father was among those
who flocked to Ems to do homage to the royal personage who deigns to
assume the title of Count de Chambord."

"My own ancestors clung to the descendants of James II. till their claims
were buried in the grave of the last Stuart, and I honour the gallant men
who, like your father, revere in an exile the heir to their ancient
kings."

The Englishman said this with grace and feeling; the Marquis's heart
warmed to him at once.

"The first loyal 'gentilhome' I have met at Paris," thought the
Legitimist; "and, oh, shame! not a Frenchman!" Graham Vane, now
stretching himself and accepting the cigar which Lemercier offered him,
said to that gentleman "You who know your Paris by heart--everybody and
everything therein worth the knowing, with many bodies and many things
that are not worth it--can you inform me who and what is a certain lady
who every fine day may be seen walking in a quiet spot at the outskirts
of the Bois de Boulogne, not far from the Baron de Rothschild's villa?
The said lady arrives at this selected spot in a dark-blue coupe without
armorial bearings, punctually at the hour of three. She wears always the
same dress,--a kind of gray pearl-coloured silk, with a 'cachemire'
shawl. In age she may be somewhat about twenty--a year or so more or
less--and has a face as haunting as a Medusa's; not, however, a face to
turn a man into a stone, but rather of the two turn a stone into a man.
A clear paleness, with a bloom like an alabaster lamp with the light
flashing through. I borrow that illustration from Sare Scott, who
applied it to Milor Bee-ren."

"I have not seen the lady you describe," answered Lemercier, feeling
humiliated by the avowal; "in fact, I have not been in that sequestered
part of the Bois for months; but I will go to-morrow: three o'clock you
say,--leave it to me; to-morrow evening, if she is a Parisienne, you
shall know all about her. But, mon cher, you are not of a jealous
temperament to confide your discovery to another."

"Yes, I am of a very jealous temperament," replied the Englishman; "but
jealousy comes after love, and not before it. I am not in love; I am
only haunted. To-morrow evening, then, shall we dine at Philippe's,
seven o'clock?"

"With all my heart," said Lemercier; "and you too, Alain?"

"Thank you, no," said the Marquis, briefly; and he rose, drew on his
gloves, and took up his hat.

At these signals of departure, the Englishman, who did not want tact nor
delicacy, thought that he had made himself 'de trop' in the 'tete-a-tete'
of two friends of the same age and nation; and, catching up his paletot,
said hastily, "No, Marquis, do not go yet, and leave our host in
solitude; for I have an engagement which presses, and only looked in at
Lemercier's for a moment, seeing the light at his windows. Permit me to
hope that our acquaintance will not drop, and inform me where I may have
the honour to call on you."

"Nay," said the Marquis; "I claim the right of a native to pay my
respects first to the foreigner who visits our capital, and," he added
in a lower tone, "who speaks so nobly of those who revere its exiles."

The Englishman saluted, and walked slowly towards the door; but on
reaching the threshold turned back and made a sign to Lemercier,
unperceived by Alain.

Frederic understood the sign, and followed Graham Vane into the adjoining
room, closing the door as he passed.

"My dear Lemercier, of course I should not have intruded on you at this
hour on a mere visit of ceremony. I called to say that the Mademoiselle
Duval whose address you sent me is not the right one,--not the lady whom,
knowing your wide range of acquaintance, I asked you to aid me in finding
out."

"Not the right Duval? Diable! she answered your description, exactly."

"Not at all."

"You said she was very pretty and young,--under twenty."

"You forgot that I said she deserved that description twenty-one years
ago."

"Ah, so you did; but some ladies are always young. 'Age,' says a wit in
the 'Figaro,' 'tis a river which the women compel to reascend to its
source when it has flowed onward more than twenty years.' Never mind:
'soyez tranquille;' I will find your Duval yet if she is to be found.
But why could not the friend who commissioned you to inquire choose a
name less common? Duval! every street in Paris has a shop-door over
which is inscribed the name of Duval."

"Quite true, there is the difficulty; however, my dear Lemercier, pray
continue to look out for a Louise Duval who was young and pretty twenty-
one years ago: this search ought to interest me more than that which I
entrusted to you tonight, respecting the pearly-robed lady; for in the
last I but gratify my own whim, in the first I discharge a promise to a
friend. You, so perfect a Frenchman, know the difference; honour is
engaged to the first. Be sure you let me know if you find any other
Madame or Mademoiselle Duval; and of course you remember your promise not
to mention to any one the commission of inquiry you so kindly undertake.
I congratulate you on your friendship for M. de Rochebriant. What a
noble countenance and manner!"

Lemercier returned to the Marquis. "Such a pity you can't dine with us
to-morrow. I fear you made but a poor dinner to-day. But it is always
better to arrange the menu beforehand. I will send to Philippe's
tomorrow. Do not be afraid."

The Marquis paused a moment, and on his young face a proud struggle was
visible. At last he said, bluntly and manfully,

"My dear Frederic, your world and mine are not and cannot be the same.
Why should I be ashamed to own to my old schoolfellow that I am poor,
--very poor; that the dinner I have shared with you to-day is to me a
criminal extravagance? I lodge in a single chamber on the fourth-story;
I dine off a single plat at a small restaurateur's; the utmost income I
can allow to myself does not exceed five thousand francs a year: my
fortunes I cannot hope much to improve. In his own country Alain de
Rochebriant has no career." Lemercier was so astonished by this
confession that he remained for some moments silent, eyes and mouth both
wide open; at length he sprang up, embraced his friend well-nigh sobbing,
and exclaimed, "'Tant mieux pour moi!' You must take your lodging with
me. I have a charming bedroom to spare. Don't say no. It will raise my
own position to say 'I and Rochebriant keep house together.' It must be
so. Come here to-morrow. As for not having a career,--bah! I and
Duplessis will settle that. You shall be a millionaire in two years.
Meanwhile we will join capitals: I my paltry notes, you your grand name.
Settled!"

"My dear, dear Frederic," said the young noble, deeply affected, "on
reflection you will see what you propose is impossible. Poor I may be
without dishonour; live at another man's cost I cannot do without
baseness. It does not require to be 'gentilhomme' to feel that: it is
enough to be a Frenchman. Come and see me when you can spare the time.
There is my address. You are the only man in Paris to whom I shall be at
home. Au revoir." And breaking away from Lemercier's clasp, the Marquis
hurried off.

CHAPTER III.

Alain reached the house in which he lodged. Externally a fine house, it
had been the hotel of a great family in the old regime. On the first
floor were still superb apartments, with ceilings painted by Le Brun,
with walls on which the thick silks still seemed fresh. These rooms were
occupied by a rich 'agent de change;' but, like all such ancient palaces,
the upper stories were wretchedly defective even in the comforts which
poor men demand nowadays: a back staircase, narrow, dirty, never lighted,
dark as Erebus, led to the room occupied by the Marquis, which might be
naturally occupied by a needy student or a virtuous 'grisette.' But
there was to him a charm in that old hotel, and the richest 'locataire'
therein was not treated with a respect so ceremonious as that which at
tended the lodger on the fourth story. The porter and his wife were
Bretons; they came from the village of Rochebriant; they had known
Alain's parents in their young days; it was their kinsman who had
recommended him to the hotel which they served: so, when he paused at
the lodge for his key, which he had left there, the porter's wife was in
waiting for his return, and insisted on lighting him upstairs and seeing
to his fire, for after a warm day the night had turned to that sharp
biting cold which is more trying in Paris than even in London.

The old woman, running up the stairs before him, opened the door of his
room, and busied herself at the fire. "Gently, my good Marthe," said he,
"that log suffices. I have been extravagant to-day, and must pinch for
it."

"M. le Marquis jests," said the old woman, laughing.

"No, Marthe; I am serious. I have sinned, but I shall reform. 'Entre
nous,' my dear friend, Paris is very dear when one sets one's foot out
of doors: I must soon go back to Rochebriant."

"When M. le Marquis goes back to Rochebriant he must take with him a
Madame la Marquise,--some pretty angel with a suitable dot."

"A dot suitable to the ruins of Rochebriant would not suffice to repair
them, Marthe: give me my dressing-gown, and good-night."

"'Bon repos, M. le Marquis! beaux reves, et bel avenir.'"

"'Bel avenir!'" murmured the young man, bitterly, leaning his cheek on
his hand; "what fortune fairer than the present can be mine? yet inaction
in youth is more keenly felt than in age. How lightly I should endure
poverty if it brought poverty's ennobling companion, Labour,--denied to
me! Well, well; I must go back to the old rock: on this ocean there is
no sail, not even an oar, for me."

Alain de Rochebriant had not been reared to the expectation of poverty.
The only son of a father whose estates were large beyond those of most
nobles in modern France, his destined heritage seemed not unsuitable to
his illustrious birth. Educated at a provincial academy, he had been
removed at the age of sixteen to Rochebriant, and lived there simply and
lonelily enough, but still in a sort of feudal state, with an aunt, an
elder and unmarried sister to his father.

His father he never saw but twice after leaving college. That brilliant
seigneur visited France but rarely, for very brief intervals, residing
wholly abroad. To him went all the revenues of Rochebriant save what
sufficed for the manage of his son and his sister. It was the cherished
belief of these two loyal natures that the Marquis secretly devoted his
fortune to the cause of the Bourbons; how, they knew not, though they
often amused themselves by conjecturing: and, the young man, as he grew
up, nursed the hope that he should soon hear that the descendant of Henri
Quatre had crossed the frontier on a white charger and hoisted the old
gonfalon with its 'fleur-de-lis.' Then, indeed, his own career would be
opened, and the sword of the Kerouecs drawn from its sheath. Day after
day he expected to hear of revolts, of which his noble father was
doubtless the soul. But the Marquis, though a sincere Legitimist, was
by no means an enthusiastic fanatic. He was simply a very proud, a very
polished, a very luxurious, and, though not without the kindliness and
generosity which were common attributes of the old French noblesse, a
very selfish grand seigneur.

Losing his wife (who died the first year of marriage in giving birth to
Alain) while he was yet very young, he had lived a frank libertine life
until he fell submissive under tho despotic yoke of a Russian Princess,
who, for some mysterious reason, never visited her own country and
obstinately refused to reside in France. She was fond of travel, and
moved yearly from London to Naples, Naples to Vienna, Berlin, Madrid,
Seville, Carlsbad, Baden-Baden,--anywhere for caprice or change, except
Paris. This fair wanderer succeeded in chaining to herself the heart and
the steps of the Marquis de Rochebriant.

She was very rich; she lived semi-royally. Hers was just the house in
which it suited the Marquis to be the 'enfant qate.' I suspect that,
cat-like, his attachment was rather to the house than to the person of
his mistress. Not that he was domiciled with the Princess; that would
have been somewhat too much against the proprieties, greatly too much
against the Marquis's notions of his own dignity. He had his own
carriage, his own apartments, his own suite, as became so grand a
seigneur and the lover of so grand a dame. His estates, mortgaged before
he came to them, yielded no income sufficient for his wants; he mortgaged
deeper and deeper, year after year, till he could mortgage them no more.
He sold his hotel at Paris; he accepted without scruple his sister's
fortune; he borrowed with equal 'sang froid' the two hundred thousand
francs which his son on coming of age inherited from his mother.
Alain yielded that fortune to him without a murmur,--nay, with pride;
he thought it destined to go towards raising a regiment for the
fleur-de-lis.

To do the Marquis justice, he was fully persuaded that he should shortly
restore to his sister and son what he so recklessly took from them. He
was engaged to be married to his Princess so soon as her own husband
died. She had been separated from the Prince for many years, and every
year it was said he could not last a year longer. But he completed the
measure of his conjugal iniquities by continuing to live; and one day,
by mistake, Death robbed the lady of the Marquis instead of the Prince.

This was an accident which the Marquis had never counted upon. He was
still young enough to consider himself young; in fact, one principal
reason for keeping Alain secluded in Bretagne was his reluctance to
introduce into the world a son "as old as myself" he would say
pathetically. The news of his death, which happened at Baden after a
short attack of bronchitis caught in a supper 'al fresco' at the old
castle, was duly transmitted to Rochebriant by the Princess; and the
shock to Alain and his aunt was the greater because they had seen so
little of the departed that they regarded him as a heroic myth, an
impersonation of ancient chivalry, condemning himself to voluntary exile
rather than do homage to usurpers. But from their grief they were soon
roused by the terrible doubt whether Rochebriant could still be retained
in the family. Besides the mortgagees, creditors from half the capitals
in Europe sent in their claims; and all the movable effects transmitted
to Alain by his father's confidential Italian valet, except sundry
carriages and horses which were sold at Baden for what they would fetch,
were a magnificent dressing-case, in the secret drawer of which were some
bank-notes amounting to thirty thousand francs, and three large boxes
containing the Marquis's correspondence, a few miniature female
portraits, and a great many locks of hair.

Wholly unprepared for the ruin that stared him in the face, the young
Marquis evinced the natural strength of his character by the calmness
with which he met the danger, and the intelligence with which he
calculated and reduced it.

By the help of the family notary in the neighbouring town, he made
himself master of his liabilities and his means; and he found that, after
paying all debts and providing for the interest of the mortgages, a
property which ought to have realized a rental of L10,000 a year yielded
not more than L400. Nor was even this margin safe, nor the property out
of peril; for the principal mortgagee, who was a capitalist in Paris
named Louvier, having had during the life of the late Marquis more than
once to wait for his half-yearly interest longer than suited his
patience,--and his patience was not enduring,--plainly declared that if
the same delay recurred he should put his right of seizure in force; and
in France still more than in England, bad seasons seriously affect the
security of rents. To pay away L9,600 a year regularly out of L10,000,
with the penalty of forfeiting the whole if not paid,--whether crops may
fail, farmers procrastinate, and timber fall in price,--is to live with
the sword of Damocles over one's head.

For two years and more, however, Alain met his difficulties with prudence
and vigour; he retrenched the establishment hitherto kept at the chateau,
resigned such rural pleasures as he had been accustomed to indulge, and
lived like one of his petty farmers. But the risks of the future
remained undiminished.

"There is but one way, Monsieur le Marquis," said the family notary,
M. Hebert, "by which you can put your estate in comparative safety.
Your father raised his mortgages from time to time, as he wanted money,
and often at interest above the average market interest. You may add
considerably to your income by consolidating all these mortgages into one
at a lower percentage, and in so doing pay off this formidable mortgagee,
M. Louvier, who, I shrewdly suspect, is bent upon becoming the proprietor
of Rochebriant. Unfortunately those few portions of your land which were
but lightly charged, and, lying contiguous to small proprietors, were
coveted by them, and could be advantageously sold, are already gone to
pay the debts of Monsieur the late Marquis. There are, however, two
small farms which, bordering close on the town of S_____, I think I could
dispose of for building purposes at high rates; but these lands are
covered by M. Louvier's general mortgage, and he has refused to release
them, unless the whole debt be paid. Were that debt therefore
transferred to another mortgagee, we might stipulate for their exception,
and in so doing secure a sum of more than 100,000 francs, which you could
keep in reserve for a pressing or unforeseen occasion, and make the
nucleus of a capital devoted to the gradual liquidation of the charges on
the estate. For with a little capital, Monsieur le Marquis, your rent-
roll might be very greatly increased, the forests and orchards improved,
those meadows round S_____ drained and irrigated. Agriculture is
beginning to be understood in Bretagne, and your estate would soon double
its value in the hands of a spirited capitalist. My advice to you,
therefore, is to go to Paris, employ a good 'avoue,' practised in such
branch of his profession, to negotiate the consolidation of your
mortgages upon terms that will enable you to sell outlying portions,
and so pay off the charge by instalments agreed upon; to see if some safe
company or rich individual can be found to undertake for a term of years
the management of your forests, the draining of the S_____ meadows, the
superintendence of your fisheries, etc. They, it is true, will
monopolize the profits for many years,--perhaps twenty; but you are a
young man: at the end of that time you will reenter on your estate with
a rental so improved that the mortgages, now so awful, will seem to you
comparatively trivial."

In pursuance of this advice, the young Marquis had come to Paris
fortified with a letter from M. Hebert to an 'avoue' of eminence, and
with many letters from his aunt to the nobles of the Faubourg connected
with his house. Now one reason why M. Hebert had urged his client to
undertake this important business in person, rather than volunteer his
own services in Paris, was somewhat extra-professional. He had a sincere
and profound affection for Alain; he felt compassion for that young life
so barrenly wasted in seclusion and severe privations; he respected, but
was too practical a man of business to share, those chivalrous sentiments
of loyalty to an exiled dynasty which disqualified the man for the age he
lived in, and, if not greatly modified, would cut him off from the hopes
and aspirations of his eager generation. He thought plausibly enough
that the air of the grand metropolis was necessary to the mental health,
enfeebled and withering amidst the feudal mists of Bretagne; that once in
Paris, Alain would imbibe the ideas of Paris, adapt himself to some
career leading to honour and to fortune, for which he took facilities
from his high birth, an historical name too national for any dynasty not
to welcome among its adherents, and an intellect not yet sharpened by
contact and competition with others, but in itself vigorous, habituated
to thought, and vivified by the noble aspirations which belong to
imaginative natures.

At the least, Alain would be at Paris in the social position which would
afford him the opportunities of a marriage, in which his birth and rank
would be readily accepted as an equivalent to some ample fortune that
would serve to redeem the endangered seigneuries. He therefore warned
Alain that the affair for which he went to Paris might be tedious, that
lawyers were always slow, and advised him to calculate on remaining
several months, perhaps a year; delicately suggesting that his rearing
hitherto had been too secluded for his age and rank, and that a year at
Paris, even if he failed in the object which took him there, would not be
thrown away in the knowledge of men and things that would fit him better
to grapple with his difficulties on his return.

Alain divided his spare income between his aunt and himself, and had come
to Paris resolutely determined to live within the L200 a year which
remained to his share. He felt the revolution in his whole being that
commenced when out of sight of the petty principality in which he was the
object of that feudal reverence, still surviving in the more unfrequented
parts of Bretagne, for the representatives of illustrious names connected
with the immemorial legends of the province.

The very bustle of a railway, with its crowd and quickness and
unceremonious democracy of travel, served to pain and confound and
humiliate that sense of individual dignity in which he had been nurtured.
He felt that, once away from Rochebriant, he was but a cipher in the sum
of human beings. Arrived at Paris, and reaching the gloomy hotel to
which he had been recommended, he greeted even the desolation of that
solitude which is usually so oppressive to a stranger in the metropolis
of his native land. Loneliness was better than the loss of self in the
reek and pressure of an unfamiliar throng. For the first few days he had
wandered over Paris without calling even on the 'avoue' to whom M. Hebert
had directed him. He felt with the instinctive acuteness of a mind
which, under sounder training, would have achieved no mean distinction,
that it was a safe precaution to imbue himself with the atmosphere of the
place, and seize on those general ideas which in great capitals are so
contagious that they are often more accurately caught by the first
impressions than by subsequent habit, before he brought his mind into
collision with those of the individuals he had practically to deal with.

At last he repaired to the 'avoue,' M. Gandrin, Rue St. Florentin. He
had mechanically formed his idea of the abode and person of an 'avoue'
from his association with M. Hebert. He expected to find a dull house in
a dull street near the centre of business, remote from the haunts of
idlers, and a grave man of unpretending exterior and matured years.

He arrived at a hotel newly fronted, richly decorated, in the fashionable
quartier close by the Tuileries. He entered a wide 'porte cochere,' and
was directed by the concierge to mount 'au premier.' There, first
detained in an office faultlessly neat, with spruce young men at smart
desks, he was at length admitted into a noble salon, and into the
presence of a gentleman lounging in an easy-chair before a magnificent
bureau of 'marqueterie, genre Louis Seize,' engaged in patting a white
curly lapdog, with a pointed nose and a shrill bark.

The gentleman rose politely on his entrance, and released the dog, who,
after sniffing the Marquis, condescended not to bite.

"Monsieur le Marquis," said M. Gandrin, glancing at the card and the
introductory note from M. Hebert, which Alain had sent in, and which lay
on the 'secretaire' beside heaps of letters nicely arranged and labelled,
"charmed to make the honour of your acquaintance; just arrived at Paris?
So M. Hebert--a very worthy person whom I have never seen, but with whom
I have had correspondence--tells me you wish for my advice; in fact, he
wrote to me some days ago, mentioning the business in question,--
consolidation of mortgages. A very large sum wanted, Monsieur le
Marquis, and not to be had easily."

"Nevertheless," said Alain, quietly, "I should imagine that there must
be many capitalists in Paris willing to invest in good securities at fair
interest."

"You are mistaken, Marquis; very few such capitalists. Men worth money
nowadays like quick returns and large profits, thanks to the magnificent
system of 'Credit Mobilier,' in which, as you are aware, a man may place
his money in any trade or speculation without liabilities beyond his
share. Capitalists are nearly all traders or speculators."

"Then," said the Marquis, half rising, "I am to presume, sir, that you
are not likely to assist me."

"No, I don't say that, Marquis. I will look with care into the matter.
Doubtless you have with you an abstract of the, necessary documents, the
conditions of the present mortgages, the rental of the estate, its
probable prospects, and so forth."

"Sir, I have such an abstract with me at Paris; and having gone into
it myself with M. Hebert, I can pledge you my word that it is strictly
faithful to the facts."

The Marquis said this with naive simplicity, as if his word were quite
sufficient to set that part of the question at rest. M. Gandrin smiled
politely and said, "'Eh bien,' M. le Marquis: favour me with the
abstract; in a week's time you shall have my opinion. You enjoy Paris?
Greatly improved under the Emperor. 'Apropos,' Madame Gandrin receives
tomorrow evening; allow me that opportunity to present you to her."
Unprepared for the proffered hospitality, the Marquis had no option but
to murmur his gratification and assent.

In a minute more he was in the streets. The next evening he went to
Madame Gandrin's,--a brilliant reception,--a whole moving flower-bed of
"decorations" there. Having gone through the ceremony of presentation to
Madame Gandrin,--a handsome woman dressed to perfection, and conversing
with the secretary to an embassy,--the young noble ensconced himself in
an obscure and quiet corner, observing all and imagining that he escaped
observation. And as the young men of his own years glided by him, or as
their talk reached his ears, he became aware that from top to toe, within
and without, he was old-fashioned, obsolete, not of his race, not of his
day. His rank itself seemed to him a waste-paper title-deed to a
heritage long lapsed. Not thus the princely seigneurs of Rochebriant
made their 'debut' at the capital of their nation. They had had the
'entree' to the cabinets of their kings; they had glittered in the halls
of Versailles; they had held high posts of distinction in court and camp;
the great Order of St. Louis had seemed their hereditary appanage. His
father, though a voluntary exile in manhood, had been in childhood a
king's page, and throughout life remained the associate of princes; and
here, in an 'avoue's soiree,' unknown, unregarded, an expectant on an
'avoue's' patronage, stood the last lord of Rochebriant.

It is easy to conceive that Alain did not stay long. But he stayed long
enough to convince him that on L200 a year the polite society of Paris,
even as seen at M. Gandrin's, was not for him. Nevertheless, a day or
two after, he resolved to call upon the nearest of his kinsmen to whom
his aunt had given him letters. With the Count de Vandemar, one of his
fellow-nobles of the sacred Faubourg, he should be no less Rochebriant,
whether in a garret or a palace. The Vandemars, in fact, though for many
generations before the First Revolution a puissant and brilliant family,
had always recognized the Rochebriants as the head of their house,--the
trunk from which they had been slipped in the fifteenth century, when a
younger son of the Rochebriants married a wealthy heiress and took the
title with the lands of Vandemar.

Since then the two families had often intermarried. The present count
had a reputation for ability, was himself a large proprietor, and might
furnish advice to guide Alain in his negotiations with M. Gandrin. The
Hotel do Vandemar stood facing the old Hotel de Rochebriant; it was less
spacious, but not less venerable, gloomy, and prison-like.

As he turned his eyes from the armorial scutcheon which still rested,
though chipped and mouldering, over the portals of his lost ancestral
house, and was about to cross the street, two young men, who seemed two
or three years older than himself, emerged on horseback from the Hotel
de Vandemar.

Handsome young men, with the lofty look of the old race, dressed with the
punctilious care of person which is not foppery in men of birth, but
seems part of the self-respect that appertains to the old chivalric point
of honour. The horse of one of these cavaliers made a caracole which
brought it nearly upon Alain as he was about to cross. The rider,
checking his steed, lifted his hat to Alain and uttered a word of apology
in the courtesy of ancient high-breeding, but still with condescension as
to an inferior. This little incident, and the slighting kind of notice
received from coevals of his own birth, and doubtless his own blood,--for
he divined truly that they were the sons of the Count de Vandemar,--
disconcerted Alain to a degree which perhaps a Frenchman alone can
comprehend. He had even half a mind to give up his visit and turn back.
However, his native manhood prevailed over that morbid sensitiveness
which, born out of the union of pride and poverty, has all the effects
of vanity, and yet is not vanity itself.

The Count was at home, a thin spare man with a narrow but high forehead,
and an expression of countenance keen, severe, and 'un peu moqueuse.'

He received the Marquis, however, at first with great cordiality,
kissed him on both sides of his cheek, called him "cousin," expressed
immeasurable regret that the Countess was gone out on one of the missions
of charity in which the great ladies of the Faubourg religiously interest
themselves, and that his sons had just ridden forth to the Bois.

As Alain, however, proceeded, simply and without false shame,
to communicate the object of his visit at Paris, the extent of his
liabilities, and the penury of his means, the smile vanished from
the Count's face. He somewhat drew back his fauteuil in the movement
common to men who wish to estrange themselves from some other man's
difficulties; and when Alain came to a close, the Count remained some
moments seized with a slight cough; and, gazing intently on the carpet,
at length he said, "My dear young friend, your father behaved extremely
ill to you,--dishonourably, fraudulently."

"Hold!" said the Marquis, colouring high. "Those are words no man can
apply to my father in my presence."

The Count stared, shrugged his shoulders, and replied with 'sang froid,'
"Marquis, if you are contented with your father's conduct, of course it
is no business of mine: he never injured me. I presume, however, that,
considering my years and my character, you come to me for advice: is it
so?"

Alain bowed his head in assent.

"There are four courses for one in your position to take," said the
Count, placing the index of the right hand successively on the thumb and
three fingers of the left,--"four courses, and no more.

"First. To do as your notary recommended: consolidate your mortgages,
patch up your income as you best can, return to Rochebriant, and devote
the rest of your existence to the preservation of your property. By that
course your life will be one of permanent privation, severe struggle; and
the probability is that you will not succeed: there will come one or two
bad seasons, the farmers will fail to pay, the mortgagee will foreclose,
and you may find yourself, after twenty years of anxiety and torment,
prematurely old and without a sou.

"Course the second. Rochebriant, though so heavily encumbered as to
yield you some such income as your father gave to his chef de cuisine,
is still one of those superb 'terres' which bankers and Jews and stock-
jobbers court and hunt after, for which they will give enormous sums.
If you place it in good hands, I do not doubt that you could dispose
of the property within three months, on terms that would leave you a
considerable surplus, which, invested with judgment, would afford you
whereon you could live at Paris in a way suitable to your rank and age.
Need we go further?--does this course smile to you?"

"Pass on, Count; I will defend to the last what I take from my ancestors,
and cannot voluntarily sell their roof-tree and their tombs."

"Your name would still remain, and you would be just as well received
in Paris, and your 'noblesse' just as implicitly conceded, if all Judaea
encamped upon Rochebriant. Consider how few of us 'gentilshommes' of the
old regime have any domains left to us. Our names alone survive: no
revolution can efface them."

"It may be so, but pardon me; there are subjects on which we cannot
reason,--we can but feel. Rochebriant may be torn from me, but I cannot
yield it."

"I proceed to the third course. Keep the chateau and give up its
traditions; remain 'de facto' Marquis of Rochebriant, but accept the new
order of things. Make yourself known to the people in power. They will
be charmed to welcome you a convert from the old noblesse is a guarantee
of stability to the new system. You will be placed in diplomacy;
effloresce into an ambassador, a minister,--and ministers nowadays
have opportunities to become enormously rich."

"That course is not less impossible than the last. Till Henry V.
formally resign his right to the throne of Saint Louis, I can be servant
to no other man seated on that throne."

"Such, too, is my creed," said the Count, "and I cling to it; but my
estate is not mortgaged, and I have neither the tastes nor the age for
public employments. The last course is perhaps better than the rest; at
all events it is the easiest. A wealthy marriage; even if it must be a
'mesalliance.' I think at your age, with your appearance, that your name
is worth at least two million francs in the eyes of a rich 'roturier'
with an ambitious daughter."

"Alas!" said the young man, rising, "I see I shall have to go back to
Rochebriant. I cannot sell my castle, I cannot sell my creed, and I
cannot sell my name and myself."

"The last all of us did in the old 'regime,' Marquis. Though I still
retain the title of Vandemar, my property comes from the Farmer-General's
daughter, whom my great-grandfather, happily for us, married in the days
of Louis Quinze. Marriages with people of sense and rank have always
been 'marriages de convenance' in France. It is only in 'le petit monde'
that men having nothing marry girls having nothing, and I don't believe
they are a bit the happier for it. On the contrary, the 'quarrels de
menage' leading to frightful crimes appear by the 'Gazette des Tribunaux'
to be chiefly found among those who do not sell themselves at the altar."

The old Count said this with a grim 'persiflage.' He was a Voltairian.

Voltairianism, deserted by the modern Liberals of France, has its chief
cultivation nowadays among the wits of the old 'regime.' They pick up
its light weapons on the battle-field on which their fathers perished,
and re-feather against the 'canaille' the shafts which had been pointed
against the 'noblesse.'

"Adieu, Count," said Alain, rising; "I do not thank you less for your
advice because I have not the wit to profit by it."

"'Au revoir,' my cousin; you will think better of it when you have been
a month or two at Paris. By the way, my wife receives every Wednesday;
consider our house yours."

"Count, can I enter into the world which Madame la Comtesse receives, in
the way that becomes my birth, on the income I take from my fortune?"

The Count hesitated. "No," said he at last, frankly; "not because you
will be less welcome or less respected, but because I see that you have
all the pride and sensitiveness of a 'seigneur de province.' Society
would therefore give you pain, not pleasure. More than this, I know,
by the remembrance of my own youth and the sad experience of my own
sons, that you would be irresistibly led into debt, and debt in your
circumstances would be the loss of Rochebriant. No; I invite you to
visit us. I offer you the most select but not the most brilliant circles
of Paris, because my wife is religious, and frightens away the birds of
gay plumage with the scarecrows of priests and bishops. But if you
accept my invitation and my offer, I am bound, as an old man of the world
to a young kinsman, to say that the chances are that you will be ruined."

"I thank you, Count, for your candour; and I now acknowledge that I have
found a relation and a guide," answered the Marquis, with nobility of
mien that was not without a pathos which touched the hard heart of the
old man.

"Come at least whenever you want a sincere if a rude friend;" and though
he did not kiss his cousin's cheek this time, he gave him, with more
sincerity, a parting shake of the hand.

And these made the principal events in Alain's Paris life till he met
Frederic Lemercier. Hitherto he had received no definite answer from
M. Gandrin, who had postponed an interview, not having had leisure to
make himself master of all the details in the abstract sent to him.

CHAPTER IV.

The next day, towards the afternoon, Frederic Lemercier, somewhat
breathless from the rapidity at which he had ascended to so high an
eminence, burst into Alain's chamber.

"'Br-r! mon cher;' what superb exercise for the health--how it must
strengthen the muscles and expand the chest! After this who should
shrink from scaling Mont Blanc? Well, well. I have been meditating on
your business ever since we parted. But I would fain know more of its
details. You shall confide them to me as we drive through the Bois. My
coupe is below, and the day is beautiful; come."

To the young Marquis, the gayety, the heartiness of his college friend
were a cordial. How different from the dry counsels of the Count de
Vandemar! Hope, though vaguely, entered into his heart. Willingly he
accepted Frederic's invitation, and the young men were soon rapidly borne
along the Champs Elysees. As briefly as he could Alain described the
state of his affairs, the nature of his mortgages, and the result of his
interview with M. Gandrin.

Frederic listened attentively. "Then Gandrin has given you as yet no
answer?"

"None; but I have a note from him this morning asking me to call
to-morrow."

"After you have seen him, decide on nothing,--if he makes you any offer.
Get back your abstract, or a copy of it, and confide it to me. Gandrin
ought to help you; he transacts affairs in a large way. 'Belle
clientele' among the millionnaires. But his clients expect fabulous
profits, and so does he. As for your principal mortgagee, Louvier, you
know, of course, who he is."

"No, except that M. Hebert told me that he was very rich."

"'Rich' I should think so; one of the Kings of Finance, Ah! observe
those young men on horseback."

Alain looked forth and recognized the two cavaliers whom he had
conjectured to be the sons of the Count de Vandemar.

"Those 'beaux garcons' are fair specimens of your Faubourg," said
Frederic; "they would decline my acquaintance because my grandfather kept
a shop, and they keep a shop between them."

"A shop! I am mistaken, then. Who are they?"

"Raoul and Enguerrand, sons of that mocker of man, the Count de
Vandemar."

"And they keep a shop! You are jesting."

"A shop at which you may buy gloves and perfumes, Rue de la Chaussee
d'Antin. Of course they don't serve at the counter; they only invest
their pocket-money in the speculation; and, in so doing, treble at least
their pocket-money, buy their horses, and keep their grooms."

"Is it possible! nobles of such birth! How shocked the Count would be
if he knew it!"

"Yes, very much shocked if he was supposed to know it. But he is too
wise a father not to give his sons limited allowances and unlimited
liberty, especially the liberty to add to the allowances as they please.
Look again at them; no better riders and more affectionate brothers since
the date of Castor and Pollux. Their tastes indeed differ--Raoul is
religious and moral, melancholy and dignified; Enguerrand is a lion of
the first water,--elegant to the tips of his nails. These demigods
nevertheless are very mild to mortals. Though Enguerrand is the best
pistol-shot in Paris, and Raoul the best fencer, the first is so good-
tempered that you would be a brute to quarrel with him, the last so true
a Catholic, that if you quarrelled with him you need not fear his sword.
He would not die in the committal of what the Church holds a mortal sin."

"Are you speaking ironically? Do you mean to imply that men of the name
of Vandemar are not brave?"

On the contrary, I believe that, though masters of their weapons, they
are too brave to abuse their skill; and I must add that, though they are
sleeping partners in a shop, they would not cheat you of a farthing.
Benign stars on earth, as Castor and Pollux were in heaven."

"But partners in a shop!"

"Bah! when a minister himself, like the late M. de M______, kept a shop,
and added the profits of 'bons bons' to his revenue, you may form some
idea of the spirit of the age. If young nobles are not generally
sleeping partners in shops, still they are more or less adventurers in
commerce. The Bourse is the profession of those who have no other
profession. You have visited the Bourse?"

"No."

"No! this is just the hour. We have time yet for the Bois. Coachman,
drive to the Bourse."

"The fact is," resumed Frederic, "that gambling is one of the wants of
civilized men. The 'rouge-et-noir' and 'roulette' tables are forbidden;
the hells closed: but the passion for making money without working for it
must have its vent, and that vent is the Bourse. As instead of a hundred
wax-lights you now have one jet of gas, so instead of a hundred hells you
have now one Bourse, and--it is exceedingly convenient; always at hand;
no discredit being seen there as it was to be seen at Frascati's; on the
contrary, at once respectable, and yet the mode."

The coupe stops at the Bourse, our friends mount the steps, glide through
the pillars, deposit their canes at a place destined to guard them, and
the Marquis follows Frederic up a flight of stairs till he gains the open
gallery round a vast hall below. Such a din! such a clamour!
disputations, wrangling, wrathful.

Here Lemercier distinguished some friends, whom he joined for a few
minutes.

Alain left alone, looked down into the hall. He thought himself in some
stormy scene of the First Revolution. An English contested election in
the market-place of a borough when the candidates are running close on
each other--the result doubtful, passions excited, the whole borough in
civil war--is peaceful compared to the scene at the Bourse.

Bulls and bears screaming, bawling, gesticulating, as if one were about
to strangle the other; the whole, to an uninitiated eye, a confusion, a
Babel, which it seems absolutely impossible to reconcile to the notion of
quiet mercantile transactions, the purchase and sale of shares and
stocks. As Alain gazed bewildered, he felt himself gently touched, and,
looking round, saw the Englishman.

"A lively scene!" whispered Mr. Vane. "This is the heart of Paris: it
beats very loudly."

"Is your Bourse in London like this?"

"I cannot tell you: at our Exchange the general public are not admitted:
the privileged priests of that temple sacrifice their victims in closed
penetralia, beyond which the sounds made in the operation do not travel
to ears profane. But had we an Exchange like this open to all the world,
and placed, not in a region of our metropolis unknown to fashion, but in
some elegant square in St. James's or at Hyde Park Corner, I suspect that
our national character would soon undergo a great change, and that all
our idlers and sporting-men would make their books there every day,
instead of waiting long months in 'ennui' for the Doncaster and the
Derby. At present we have but few men on the turf; we should then have
few men not on Exchange, especially if we adopt your law, and can
contrive to be traders without risk of becoming bankrupts. Napoleon I.
called us a shopkeeping nation. Napoleon III. has taught France to excel
us in everything, and certainly he has made Paris a shopkeeping city."

Alain thought of Raoul and Enguerrand, and blushed to find that what he
considered a blot on his countrymen was so familiarly perceptible to a
foreigner's eye.

"And the Emperor has done wisely, at least for the time," continued the
Englishman, with a more thoughtful accent. "He has found vent thus for
that very dangerous class in Paris society to which the subdivision of
property gave birth; namely the crowd of well-born, daring young men
without fortune and without profession. He has opened the 'Bourse' and
said, 'There, I give you employment, resource, an 'avenir.'' He has
cleared the byways into commerce and trade, and opened new avenues of
wealth to the noblesse, whom the great Revolution so unwisely beggared.
What other way to rebuild a 'noblesse' in France, and give it a chance
of power be side an access to fortune? But to how many sides of your
national character has the Bourse of Paris magnetic attraction! You
Frenchmen are so brave that you could not be happy without facing
danger, so covetous of distinction that you would pine yourselves away
without a dash, coute quo coute, at celebrity and a red ribbon. Danger!
look below at that arena: there it is; danger daily, hourly. But there
also is celebrity; win at the Bourse, as of old in a tournament, and
paladins smile on you, and ladies give you their scarves, or, what is
much the same, they allow you to buy their cachemires. Win at the
Bourse,--what follows? the Chamber, the Senate, the Cross, the
Minister's 'portefeuille.' I might rejoice in all this for the sake of
Europe,--could it last, and did it not bring the consequences that
follow the demoralization which attends it. The Bourse and the Credit
Mobilier keep Paris quiet, at least as quiet as it can be. These are the
secrets of this reign of splendour; these the two lions couchants on
which rests the throne of the Imperial reconstructor."

Alain listened surprised and struck. He had not given the Englishman
credit for the cast of mind which such reflections evinced.

Here Lemercier rejoined them, and shook hands with Graham Vane, who,
taking him aside, said, "But you promised to go to the Bois, and indulge
my insane curiosity about the lady in the pearl-coloured robe?"

"I have not forgotten; it is not half-past two yet; you said three.
'Soyez tranquille;' I drive thither from the Bourse with Rochebriant."

"Is it necessary to take with you that very good-looking Marquis?"

"I thought you said you were not jealous, because not yet in love.
However, if Rochebriant occasions you the pang which your humble servant
failed to inflict, I will take care that he do not see the lady."

"No," said the Englishman; "on consideration, I should be very much
obliged to any one with whom she would fall in love. That would
disenchant me. Take the Marquis by all means."

Meanwhile Alain, again looking down, saw just under him, close by one
of the pillars, Lucien Duplessis. He was standing apart from the throng,
a small space cleared round himself, and two men who had the air of
gentlemen of the 'beau monde,' with whom he was conferring. Duplessis,
thus seen, was not like the Duplessis at the restaurant. It would be
difficult to explain what the change was, but it forcibly struck Alain:
the air was more dignified, the expression keener; there was a look of
conscious power and command about the man even at that distance; the
intense, concentrated intelligence of his eye, his firm lip, his marked
features, his projecting, massive brow, would have impressed a very
ordinary observer. In fact, the man was here in his native element; in
the field in which his intellect gloried, commanded, and had signalized
itself by successive triumphs. Just thus may be the change in the great
orator whom you deemed insignificant in a drawing-room, when you see his
crest rise above a reverential audience; or the great soldier, who was
not distinguishable from the subaltern in a peaceful club, could you see
him issuing the order to his aids-de-camp amidst the smoke and roar of
the battle-field.

"Ah, Marquis!" said Graham Vane, "are you gazing at Duplessis? He is the
modern genius of Paris. He is at once the Cousin, the Guizot, and the
Victor Hugo of speculation. Philosophy, Eloquence, audacious Romance,--
all Literature now is swallowed up in the sublime epic of 'Agiotage,' and
Duplessis is the poet of the Empire."

"Well said, M. Grarm Varn," cried Frederic, forgetting his recent lesson
in English names. "Alain underrates that great man. How could an
Englishman appreciate him so well?"

"'Ma foi!'" returned Graham, quietly. "I am studying to think at Paris,
in order some day or other to know how to act in London. Time for the
Bois. Lemercier, we meet at seven,--Philippe's."

CHAPTER V.

"What do you think of the Bourse?" asked Lemercier, as their carriage
took the way to the Bois.

"I cannot think of it yet; I am stunned. It seems to me as if I had been
at a 'Sabbat,' of which the wizards were 'agents de change,' but not less
bent upon raising Satan."

"Pooh! the best way to exorcise Satan is to get rich enough not to be
tempted by him. The fiend always loved to haunt empty places; and of all
places nowadays he prefers empty purses and empty stomachs."

"But do all people get rich at the Bourse? or is not one man's wealth
many men's ruin?"

"That is a question not very easy to answer; but under our present system
Paris gets rich, though at the expense of individual Parisians. I will
try and explain. The average luxury is enormously increased even in my
experience; what were once considered refinements and fopperies are now
called necessary comforts. Prices are risen enormously, house-rent
doubled within the last five or six years; all articles of luxury are
very much dearer; the very gloves I wear cost twenty per cent more than I
used to pay for gloves of the same quality. How the people we meet live,
and live so well, is an enigma that would defy AEdipus if AEdipus were
not a Parisian. But the main explanation is this: speculation and
commerce, with the facilities given to all investments, have really
opened more numerous and more rapid ways to fortune than were known a few
years ago.

"Crowds are thus attracted to Paris, resolved to venture a small capital
in the hope of a large one; they live on that capital, not on their
income, as gamesters do. There is an idea among us that it is necessary
to seem rich in order to become rich. Thus there is a general
extravagance and profusion. English milords marvel at our splendour.
Those who, while spending their capital as their income, fail in their
schemes of fortune, after one, two, three, or four years, vanish. What
becomes of them, I know no more than I do what becomes of the old moons.
Their place is immediately supplied by new candidates. Paris is thus
kept perennially sumptuous and splendid by the gold it engulfs. But then
some men succeed,--succeed prodigiously, preternaturally; they make
colossal fortunes, which are magnificently expended. They set an example
of show and pomp, which is of course the more contagious because so many
men say, 'The other day those millionnaires were as poor as we are; they
never economized; why should we?' Paris is thus doubly enriched,--by the
fortunes it swallows up, and by the fortunes it casts up; the last being
always reproductive, and the first never lost except to the individuals."

"I understand: but what struck me forcibly at the scene we have left was
the number of young men there; young men whom I should judge by their
appearance to be gentlemen, evidently not mere spectators,--eager,
anxious, with tablets in their hands. That old or middle-aged men should
find a zest in the pursuit of gain I can understand, but youth and
avarice seem to me a new combination, which Moliere never divined in his
'Avare.'"

"Young men, especially if young gentlemen, love pleasure; and pleasure in
this city is very dear. This explains why so many young men frequent the
Bourse. In the old gaining now suppressed, young men were the majority;
in the days of your chivalrous forefathers it was the young nobles, not
the old, who would stake their very mantles and swords on a cast of the
die. And, naturally enough, _mon cher_; for is not youth the season of
hope, and is not hope the goddess of gaming, whether at _rouge-et-noir_
or the Bourse?"

Alain felt himself more and more behind his generation. The acute
reasoning of Lemercier humbled his _amour propre_. At college Lemercier
was never considered Alain's equal in ability or book-learning. What a
stride beyond his school-fellow had Lemercier now made! How dull and
stupid the young provincial felt himself to be as compared with the easy
cleverness and half-sportive philosophy of the Parisian's fluent talk!

He sighed with a melancholy and yet with a generous envy. He had too
fine a natural perception not to acknowledge that there is a rank of mind
as well as of birth, and in the first he felt that Lemercier might well
walk before a Rochebriant; but his very humility was a proof that he
underrated himself.

Lemercier did not excel him in mind, but in experience. And just as the
drilled soldier seems a much finer fellow than the raw recruit, because
he knows how to carry himself, but after a year's discipline the raw
recruit may excel in martial air the upright hero whom he now
despairingly admires, and never dreams he can rival; so set a mind from a
village into the drill of a capital, and see it a year after; it may
tower a head higher than its recruiting-sergeant.

CHAPTER VI.

"I believe," said Lemercier, as the _coupe_ rolled through the lively
alleys of the Bois de Boulogne, "that Paris is built on a loadstone, and
that every Frenchman with some iron globules in his blood is irresistibly
attracted towards it. The English never seem to feel for London the
passionate devotion that we feel for Paris. On the contrary, the London
middle class, the commercialists, the shopkeepers, the clerks, even the
superior artisans compelled to do their business in the capital, seem
always scheming and pining to have their home out of it, though but in a
suburb."

"You have been in London, Frederic?"

"Of course; it is the mode to visit that dull and hideous metropolis."

"If it be dull and hideous, no wonder the people who are compelled to do
business in it seek the pleasures of home out of it."

"It is very droll that though the middle class entirely govern the
melancholy Albion, it is the only country in Europe in which the middle
class seem to have no amusements; nay, they legislate against amusement.
They have no leisure-day but Sunday; and on that day they close all their
theatres, even their museums and picture-galleries. What amusements
there may be in England are for the higher classes and the lowest."

"What are the amusements of the lowest class?"

"Getting drunk."

"Nothing else?"

"Yes. I was taken at night under protection of a policeman to some
cabarets, where I found crowds of that class which is the stratum below
the working class; lads who sweep crossings and hold horses, mendicants,
and, I was told, thieves, girls whom a servant-maid would not speak to,
very merry, dancing quadrilles and waltzes, and regaling themselves on
sausages,--the happiest-looking folks I found in all London; and, I must
say, conducting themselves very decently."

"Ah!" Here Lemercier pulled the check-string. "Will you object to a walk
in this quiet alley? I see some one whom I have promised the Englishman
to--But heed me, Alain, don't fall in love with her."

CHAPTER VII.

The lady in the pearl-coloured dress! Certainly it was a face that might
well arrest the eye and linger long on the remembrance.

There are certain "beauty-women" as there are certain "beauty-men," in
whose features one detects no fault, who are the show figures of any
assembly in which they appear, but who, somehow or other, inspire no
sentiment and excite no interest; they lack some expression, whether of
mind, or of soul, or of heart, without which the most beautiful face is
but a beautiful picture. This lady was not one of those "beauty-women."
Her features taken singly were by no means perfect, nor were they set off
by any brilliancy of colouring. But the countenance aroused and
impressed the imagination with a belief that there was some history
attached to it, which you longed to learn. The hair, simply parted over
a forehead unusually spacious and high for a woman, was of lustrous
darkness; the eyes, of a deep violet blue, were shaded with long lashes.

Their expression was soft and mournful, but unobservant. She did not
notice Alain and Lemercier as the two men slowly passed her. She seemed
abstracted, gazing into space as one absorbed in thought or revery. Her
complexion was clear and pale, and apparently betokened delicate health.

Lemercier seated himself on a bench beside the path, and invited Alain to
do the same. "She will return this way soon," said the Parisian, "and we
can observe her more attentively and more respectfully thus seated than
if we were on foot; meanwhile, what do you think of her? Is she French?
is she Italian? can she be English?"

"I should have guessed Italian, judging by the darkness of the hair and
the outline of the features; but do Italians have so delicate a fairness
of complexion?"

"Very rarely; and I should guess her to be French, judging by the
intelligence of her expression, the simple neatness of her dress, and by
that nameless refinement of air in which a Parisienne excels all the
descendants of Eve,--if it were not for her eyes. I never saw a
Frenchwoman with eyes of that peculiar shade of blue; and if a
Frenchwoman had such eyes, I flatter myself she would have scarcely
allowed us to pass without making some use of them."

"Do you think she is married?" asked Alain.

"I hope so; for a girl of her age, if _comme il faut_, can scarcely walk
alone in the Bois, and would not have acquired that look so intelligent,
--more than intelligent,--so poetic."

"But regard that air of unmistakable distinction; regard that expression
of face,-so pure, so virginal: _comme il faut_ she must be."

As Alain said these last words, the lady, who had turned back, was
approaching them, and in full view of their gaze. She seemed unconscious
of their existence as before, and Lemercier noticed that her lips moved
as if she were murmuring inaudibly to herself.

She did not return again, but continued her walk straight on till at the
end of the alley she entered a carriage in waiting for her, and was
driven off.

"Quick, quick!" cried Lemercier, running towards his own coupe; "we must
give chase."

Alain followed somewhat less hurriedly, and, agreeably to instructions
Lemercier had already given to his coachman, the Parisian's coupe set off
at full speed in the track of the strange lady's, which was still in
sight.

In less than twenty minutes the carriage in chase stopped at the grille
of one of those charming little villas to be found in the pleasant suburb
of A-----; a porter emerged from the lodge, opened the gate; the carriage
drove in, again stopped at the door of the house, and the two gentlemen
could not catch even a glimpse of the lady's robe as she descended from
the carriage and disappeared within the house.

"I see a cafe yonder," said Lemercier; "let us learn all we can as to the
fair unknown, over a _sorbet_ or a _petit verre_." Alain silently, but
not reluctantly, consented. He felt in the fair stranger an interest new
to his existence.

They entered the little cafe, and in a few minutes Lemercier, with the
easy _savoir vivre_ of a Parisian, had extracted from the _garcon_ as
much as probably any one in the neighbourhood knew of the inhabitants of
the villa.

It had been hired and furnished about two months previously in the name
of Signora Venosta; but, according to the report of the servants, that
lady appeared to be the gouvernante or guardian of a lady much younger,
out of whose income the villa was rented and the household maintained.

It was for her the _coupe_ was hired from Paris. The elder lady very
rarely stirred out during the day, but always accompanied the younger in
any evening visits to the theatre or the houses of friends.

It was only within the last few weeks that such visits had been made.

The younger lady was in delicate health, and under the care of an English
physician famous for skill in the treatment of pulmonary complaints. It
was by his advice that she took daily walking exercise in the Bois. The
establishment consisted of three servants, all Italians, and speaking but
imperfect French. The _garcon_ did not know whether either of the ladies
was married, but their mode of life was free from all scandal or
suspicion; they probably belonged to the literary or musical world, as
the _garcon_ had observed as their visitors the eminent author M. Savarin
and his wife; and, still more frequently, an old man not less eminent as
a musical composer.

"It is clear to me now," said Lemercier, as the two friends reseated
themselves in the carriage, "that our pearly _ange_ is some Italian
singer of repute enough in her own country to have gained already a
competence; and that, perhaps on account of her own health or her
friend's, she is living quietly here in the expectation of some
professional engagement, or the absence of some foreign lover."

"Lover! do you think that?" exclaimed Alain, in a tone of voice that
betrayed pain.

"It is possible enough; and in that case the Englishman may profit little
by the information I have promised to give him."

"You have promised the Englishman?"

"Do you not remember last night that he described the lady, and said that
her face haunted him: and I--"

"Ah! I remember now. What do you know of this Englishman? He is rich, I
suppose."

"Yes, I hear he is very rich now; that an uncle lately left him an
enormous sum of money. He was attached to the English Embassy many years
ago, which accounts for his good French and his knowledge of Parisian
life. He comes to Paris very often, and I have known him some time.
Indeed he has intrusted to me a difficult and delicate commission. The
English tell me that his father was one of the most eminent members of
their Parliament, of ancient birth, very highly connected, but ran out
his fortune and died poor; that our friend had for some years to maintain
himself, I fancy, by his pen; that he is considered very able; and, now
that his uncle has enriched him, likely to enter public life and run a
career as distinguished as his father's."

"Happy man! happy are the English," said the Marquis, with a sigh; and as
the carriage now entered Paris, he pleaded the excuse of an engagement,
bade his friend goodby, and went his way musing through the crowded
streets.

CHAPTER VIII.

LETTER FROM ISAURA CICOGNA TO MADAME DE GRANTMESNIL.

VILLA D'-----, A------.

I can never express to you, my beloved Eulalie, the strange charm which a
letter from you throws over my poor little lonely world for days after it
is received. There is always in it something that comforts, something
that sustains, but also a something that troubles and disquiets me. I
suppose Goethe is right, "that it is the property of true genius to
disturb all settled ideas," in order, no doubt, to lift them into a
higher level when they settle down again.

Your sketch of the new work you are meditating amid the orange groves of
Provence interests me intensely; yet, do you forgive me when I add that
the interest is not without terror? I do not find myself able to
comprehend how, amid those lovely scenes of Nature, your mind voluntarily
surrounds itself with images of pain and discord. I stand in awe of the
calm with which you subject to your analysis the infirmities of reason
and the tumults of passion. And all those laws of the social state which
seem to me so fixed and immovable you treat with so quiet a scorn, as if
they were but the gossamer threads which a touch of your slight woman's
hand could brush away. But I cannot venture to discuss such subjects
with you. It is only the skilled enchanter who can stand safely in the
magic circle, and compel the spirits that he summons, even if they are
evil, to minister to ends in which he foresees a good.

We continue to live here very quietly, and I do not as yet feel the worse
for the colder climate. Indeed, my wonderful doctor, who was recommended
to me as American, but is in reality English, assures me that a single
winter spent here under his care will suffice for my complete
re-establishment. Yet that career, to the training for which so many
years have been devoted, does not seem to me so alluring as it once did.

I have much to say on this subject, which I defer till I can better
collect my own thoughts on it; at present they are confused and
struggling. The great Maestro has been most gracious.

In what a radiant atmosphere his genius lives and breathes! Even in his
cynical moods, his very cynicism has in it the ring of a jocund music,--
the laugh of Figaro, not of Mephistopheles.

We went to dine with him last week. He invited to meet us Madame S-----,
who has this year conquered all opposition, and reigns alone, the great
S-----; Mr. T--------, a pianist of admirable promise; your friend
M. Savarin, wit, critic, and poet, with his pleasant, sensible wife;
and a few others, who, the Maestro confided to me in a whisper, were
authorities in the press. After dinner S----- sang to us, magnificently,
of course. Then she herself graciously turned to me, said how much she
had heard from the Maestro in my praise, and so and so. I was persuaded
to sing after her. I need not say to what disadvantage. But I forgot my
nervousness; I forgot my audience; I forgot myself, as I always do when
once my soul, as it were, finds wing in music, and buoys itself in the
air, relieved from the sense of earth. I knew not that I had succeeded
till I came to a close, and then my eyes resting on the face of the grand
prima donna, I was seized with an indescribable sadness, with a keen pang
of remorse. Perfect artiste though she be, and with powers in her own
realm of art which admit of no living equal, I saw at once that I had
pained her: she had grown almost livid; her lips were quivering, and it
was only with a great effort that she muttered out some faint words
intended for applause. I comprehended by an instinct how gradually there
can grow upon the mind of an artist the most generous that jealousy which
makes the fear of a rival annihilate the delight in art. If ever I
should achieve S-----'s fame as a singer, should I feel the same.
jealousy?--I think not now, but I have not been tested. She went away
abruptly. I spare you the recital of the compliments paid to me by my
other auditors, compliments that gave me no pleasure; for on all lips,
except those of the Maestro, they implied, as the height of eulogy, that
I had inflicted torture upon S-----. "If so," said he, "she would be as
foolish as a rose that was jealous of the whiteness of a lily. You would
do yourself great wrong, my child, if you tried to vie with the rose in
its own colour."

He patted my bended head as he spoke, with that kind of fatherly
king-like fondness with which he honours me; and I took his hand in mine,
and kissed it gratefully. "Nevertheless," said Savarin, "when the lily
comes out there will be a furious attack on it, made by the clique that
devotes itself to the rose: a lily clique will be formed en revanche, and
I foresee a fierce paper war. Do not be frightened at its first
outburst: every fame worth having must be fought for."

Is it so? have you had to fight for your fame, Eulalie? and do you hate
all contests as much as I do?

Our only other gayety since I last wrote was a soiree at M. Louvier's.
That republican millionaire was not slow in attending to the kind letter
you addressed to him recommending us to his civilities. He called at
once, placed his good offices at our disposal, took charge of my modest
fortune, which he has invested, no doubt, as safely as it is
advantageously in point of interest, hired our carriage for us, and in
short has been most amiably useful.

At his house we met many to me most pleasant, for they spoke with such
genuine appreciation of your works and yourself. But there were others
whom I should never have expected to meet under the roof of a Croesus who
has so great a stake in the order of things established. One young man--
a noble whom he specially presented to me, as a politician who would be
at the head of affairs when the Red Republic was established--asked me
whether I did not agree with him that all private property was public
spoliation, and that the great enemy to civilization was religion, no
matter in what form.

He addressed to me these tremendous questions with an effeminate lisp,
and harangued on them with small feeble gesticulations of pale dirty
fingers covered with rings.

I asked him if there were many who in France shared his ideas.

"Quite enough to carry them some day," he answered with a lofty smile.
"And the day may be nearer than the world thinks, when my confreres will
be so numerous that they will have to shoot down each other for the sake
of cheese to their bread."

That day nearer than the world thinks! Certainly, so far as one may
judge the outward signs of the world at Paris, it does not think of such
things at all. With what an air of self-content the beautiful city
parades her riches! Who can gaze on her splendid palaces, her gorgeous
shops, and believe that she will give ear to doctrines that would
annihilate private rights of property; or who can enter her crowded
churches, and dream that she can ever again install a republic too
civilized for religion?

Adieu. Excuse me for this dull letter. If I have written on much that
has little interest even for me, it is that I wish to distract my mind
from brooding over the question that interests me most, and on which I
most need your counsel. I will try to approach it in my next.

ISAURA.

FROM THE SAME TO THE SAME.

Eulalie, Eulalie!--What mocking spirit has been permitted in this modern
age of ours to place in the heart of woman the ambition which is the
prerogative of men? You indeed, so richly endowed with a man's genius,
have a right to man's aspirations. But what can justify such ambition in
me? Nothing but this one unintellectual perishable gift of a voice that
does but please in uttering the thoughts of others. Doubtless I could
make a name familiar for its brief time to the talk of Europe,--a name,
what name? a singer's name. Once I thought that name a glory. Shall I
ever forget the day when you first shone upon me; when, emerging from
childhood as from a dim and solitary bypath, I stood forlorn on the great
thoroughfare of life, and all the prospects before me stretched sad in
mists and in rain? You beamed on me then as the sun coming out from the
cloud and changing the face of earth; you opened to my sight the fairy-
land of poetry and art; you took me by the hand and said, "Courage!
there is at each step some green gap in the hedgerows, some, soft escape
from the stony thoroughfare. Beside the real life expands the ideal life
to those who seek it. Droop not, seek it: the ideal life has its
sorrows, but it never admits despair; as on the ear of him who follows
the winding course of a stream, the stream ever varies the note of its
music,--now loud with the rush of the falls; now low and calm as it
glides by the level marge of smooth banks; now sighing through the stir
of the reeds; now babbling with a fretful joy as some sudden curve on the
shore stays its flight among gleaming pebbles,--so to the soul of the
artist is the voice of the art ever fleeting beside and before him.
Nature gave thee the bird's gift of song: raise the gift into art, and
make the art thy companion.

"Art and Hope were twin-born, and they die together." See how faithfully
I remember, methinks, your very words. But the magic of the words, which
I then but dimly understood, was in your smile and in your eye, and the
queen-like wave of your hand as if beckoning to a world which lay before
you, visible and familiar as your native land. And how devotedly, with
what earnestness of passion, I gave myself up to the task of raising my
gift into an art! I thought of nothing else, dreamed of nothing else;
and oh, now sweet to me then were words of praise! "Another year yet,"
at length said the masters, "and you ascend your throne among the queens
of song." Then--then--I would have changed for no other throne on earth
my hope of that to be achieved in the realms of my art. And then came
that long fever: my strength broke down, and the Maestro said, "Rest, or
your voice is gone, and your throne is lost forever." How hateful that
rest seemed to me! You again came to my aid. You said, "The time you
think lost should be but time improved. Penetrate your mind with other
songs than the trash of Libretti. The more you habituate yourself to the
forms, the more you imbue yourself with the spirit, in which passions
have been expressed and character delineated by great writers, the more
completely you will accomplish yourself in your own special art of singer
and actress." So, then, you allured me to a new study. Ah! in so doing
did you dream that you diverted me from the old ambition? My knowledge
of French and Italian, and my rearing in childhood, which had made
English familiar to me, gave me the keys to the treasure-houses of three
languages. Naturally I began with that in which your masterpieces are
composed. Till then I had not even read your works. They were the first
I chose. How they impressed, how they startled me! what depths in the
mind of man, in the heart of woman, they revealed to me! But I owned to
you then, and I repeat it now, neither they nor any of the works in
romance and poetry which form the boast of recent French literature
satisfied yearnings for that calm sense of beauty, that divine joy in a
world beyond this world, which you had led me to believe it was the
prerogative of ideal art to bestow. And when I told you this with the
rude frankness you had bid me exercise in talk with you, a thoughtful,
melancholy shade fell over your face, and you said quietly, "You are
right, child; we, the French of our time, are the offspring of
revolutions that settled nothing, unsettled all: we resemble those
troubled States which rush into war abroad in order to re-establish peace
at home. Our books suggest problems to men for reconstructing some
social system in which the calm that belongs to art may be found at last:
but such books should not be in your hands; they are not for the
innocence and youth of women as yet unchanged by the systems which
exist." And the next day you brought me 'l'asso's great poem, the
"Gerusalemme Liberata," and said, smiling, "Art in its calm is here."

You remember that I was then at Sorrento by the order of my physician.
Never shall I forget the soft autumn day when I sat amongst the lonely
rocklets to the left of the town,--the sea before me, with scarce a
ripple; my very heart steeped in the melodies of that poem, so marvellous
for a strength disguised in sweetness, and for a symmetry in which each
proportion blends into the other with the perfectness of a Grecian
statue. The whole place seemed to me filled with the presence of the
poet to whom it had given birth. Certainly the reading of that poem
formed an era in my existence: to this day I cannot acknowledge the
faults or weaknesses which your criticisms pointed out; I believe because
they are in unison with my own nature, which yearns for harmony, and,
finding that, rests contented. I shrink from violent contrasts, and can
discover nothing tame and insipid in a continuance of sweetness and
serenity. But it was not till after I had read "La Gerusalemme" again
and again, and then sat and brooded over it, that I recognized the main
charm of the poem in the religion which clings to it as the perfume
clings to a flower,--a religion sometimes melancholy, but never to me
sad. Hope always pervades it. Surely if, as you said, "Hope is twin-
born with art," it is because art at its highest blends itself
unconsciously with religion, and proclaims its affinity with hope by its
faith in some future good more perfect than it has realized in the past.

Be this as it may, it was in this poem so pre-eminently Christian that I
found the something which I missed and craved for in modern French
masterpieces; even yours,--a something spiritual, speaking to my own
soul, calling it forth; distinguishing it as an essence apart from mere
human reason; soothing, even when it excited; making earth nearer to
heaven. And when I ran on in this strain to you after my own wild
fashion, you took my head between your hands and kissed me, and said,
"Happy are those who believe! long may that happiness be thine!" Why did
I not feel in Dante the Christian charm that I felt in Tasso? Dante in
your eyes, as in those of most judges, is infinitely the greater genius;
but reflected on the dark stream of that genius the stars are so
troubled, the heaven so threatening.

Just as my year of holiday was expiring, I turned to English literature;
and Shakspeare, of course, was the first English poet put into my hands.
It proves how childlike my mind still was, that my earliest sensation in
reading him was that of disappointment. It was not only that, despite my
familiarity with English (thanks chiefly to the care of him whom I call
my second father), there is much in the metaphorical diction of
Shakspeare which I failed to comprehend; but he seemed to me so far like
the modern French writers who affect to have found inspiration in his
muse, that he obtrudes images of pain and suffering without cause or
motive sufficiently clear to ordinary understandings, as I had taught
myself to think it ought to be in the drama.

He makes Fate so cruel that we lose sight of the mild deity behind her.
Compare, in this, Corneille's "Polyeucte," with the "Hamlet." In the
first an equal calamity befalls the good, but in their calamity they are
blessed. The death of the martyr is the triumph of his creed. But when
we have put down the English tragedy,--when Hamlet and Ophelia are
confounded in death with Polonius and the fratricidal king, we see not
what good end for humanity is achieved. The passages that fasten on our
memory do not make us happier and holier: they suggest but terrible
problems, to which they give us no solution.

In the "Horaces" of Corneille there are fierce contests, rude passions,
tears drawn from some of the bitterest sources of human pity; but then
through all stands out, large and visible to the eyes of all spectators,
the great ideal of devoted patriotism. How much of all that has been
grandest in the life of France, redeeming even its worst crimes of
revolution in the love of country, has had its origin in the "Horaces" of
Corneille. But I doubt if the fates of Coriolanus and Caesar and Brutus
and Antony, in the giant tragedies of Shakspeare, have made Englishmen
more willing to die for England. In fine, it was long before--I will not
say I understood or rightly appreciated Shakspeare, for no Englishman
would admit that I or even you could ever do so, but before I could
recognize the justice of the place his country claims for him as the
genius without an equal in the literature of Europe. Meanwhile the
ardour I had put into study, and the wear and tear of the emotions which
the study called forth, made themselves felt in a return of my former
illness, with symptoms still more alarming; and when the year was out I
was ordained to rest for perhaps another year before I could sing in
public, still less appear on the stage. How I rejoiced when I heard that
fiat! for I emerged from that year of study with a heart utterly
estranged from the profession in which I had centred my hopes before--
Yes, Eulalie, you had bid me accomplish myself for the arts of utterance;
by the study of arts in which thoughts originate the words they employ;
and in doing so I had changed myself into another being. I was forbidden
all fatigue of mind: my books were banished, but not the new self which
the books had formed. Recovering slowly through the summer, I came
hither two months since, ostensibly for the advice of Dr. C-------, but
really in the desire to commune with my own heart and be still.

And now I have poured forth that heart to you, would you persuade me
still to be a singer? If you do, remember at least how jealous and
absorbing the art of the singer and the actress is,--how completely I
must surrender myself to it, and live among books or among dreams no
more. Can I be anything else but singer? and if not, should I be
contented merely to read and to dream?

I must confide to you one ambition which during the lazy Italian summer
took possession of me; I must tell you the ambition, and add that I have
renounced it as a vain one. I had hoped that I could compose, I mean in
music. I was pleased with some things I did: they expressed in music
what I could not express in words; and one secret object in coming here
was to submit them to the great Maestro. He listened to them patiently:
he complimented me on my accuracy in the mechanical laws of composition;
he even said that my favourite airs were "touchants et gracieux."

And so he would have left me, but I stopped him timidly, and said, "Tell
me frankly, do you think that with time and study I could compose music
such as singers equal to myself would sing to?"

"You mean as a professional composer?"

"Well, yes."

"And to the abandonment of your vocation as a singer?"

"Yes."

"My dear child, I should be your worst enemy if I encouraged such a
notion: cling to the career in which you call be greatest; gain but
health, and I wager my reputation on your glorious success on the stage.
What can you be as a composer? You will set pretty music to pretty
words, and will be sung in drawing-rooms with the fame a little more or
less that generally attends the compositions of female amateurs. Aim at
something higher, as I know you would do, and you will not succeed. Is
there any instance in modern times, perhaps in any times, of a female
composer who attains even to the eminence of a third-rate opera-writer?
Composition in letters may be of no sex. In that Madame Dudevant and
your friend Madame de Grantmesnil can beat most men; but the genius of
musical composition is _homme_, and accept it as a compliment when I say
that you are essentially _femme_."

He left me, of course, mortified and humbled; but I feel he is right as
regards myself, though whether in his depreciation of our whole sex I
cannot say. But as this hope has left me, I have become more disquieted,
still more restless. Counsel me, Eulalie; counsel, and, if possible,
comfort me.
ISAURA.

FROM THE SAME TO THE SAME.

No letter from you yet, and I have left you in peace for ten days. How
do you think I have spent them? The Maestro called on us with
M. Savarin, to insist on our accompanying them on a round of the
theatres. I had not been to one since my arrival. I divined that the
kind-hearted composer had a motive in this invitation. He thought that
in witnessing the applauses bestowed on actors, and sharing in the
fascination in which theatrical illusion holds an audience, my old
passion for the stage, and with it the longing for an artiste's fame,
would revive.

In my heart I wished that his expectations might be realized. Well for
me if I could once more concentrate all my aspirations on a prize within
my reach!

We went first to see a comedy greatly in vogue, and the author thoroughly
understands the French stage of our day. The acting was excellent in its
way. The next night we went to the Odeon, a romantic melodrama in six
acts, and I know not how many tableaux. I found no fault with the acting
there. I do not give you the rest of our programme. We visited all the
principal theatres, reserving the opera and Madame S------ for the last.
Before I speak of the opera, let me say a word or two on the plays.

There is no country in which the theatre has so great a hold on the
public as in France; no country in which the successful dramatist has so
high a fame; no country perhaps in which the state of the stage so
faithfully represents the moral and intellectual condition of the people.
I say this not, of course, from my experience of countries which I have
not visited, but from all I hear of the stage in Germany and in England.

The impression left on my mind by the performances I witnessed is, that
the French people are becoming dwarfed. The comedies that please them
are but pleasant caricatures of petty sections in a corrupt society.
They contain no large types of human nature; their witticisms convey no
luminous flashes of truth; their sentiment is not pure and noble,--it is
a sickly and false perversion of the impure and ignoble into travesties
of the pure and noble.

Their melodramas cannot be classed as literature: all that really remains
of the old French genius is its vaudeville. Great dramatists create
great parts. One great part, such as a Rachel would gladly have
accepted, I have not seen in the dramas of the young generation.

High art has taken refuge in the opera; but that is not French opera.
I do not complain so much that French taste is less refined. I complain
that French intellect is lowered. The descent from "Polyeucte" to "Ruy
Blas" is great, not so much in the poetry of form as in the elevation of
thought; but the descent from "Ruy Blas" to the best drama now produced
is out of poetry altogether, and into those flats of prose which give not
even the glimpse of a mountain-top.

But now to the opera. S------ in Norma! The house was crowded, and its
enthusiasm as loud as it was genuine. You tell me that S------ never
rivalled Pasta, but certainly her Norma is a great performance. Her
voice has lost less of its freshness than I had been told, and what is
lost of it her practised management conceals or carries off.

The Maestro was quite right: I could never vie with her in her own line;
but conceited and vain as I may seem even to you in saying so, I feel in
my own line that I could command as large an applause,--of course taking
into account my brief-lived advantage of youth. Her acting, apart from
her voice, does not please me. It seems to me to want intelligence of
the subtler feelings, the under-current of emotion which constitutes the
chief beauty of the situation and the character. Am I jealous when I say
this? Read on and judge.

On our return that night, when I had seen the Venosta to bed, I went into
my own room, opened the window, and looked out. A lovely night, mild as
in spring at Florence,--the moon at her full, and the stars looking so
calm and so high beyond our reach of their tranquillity. The evergreens
in the gardens of the villas around me silvered over, and the summer
boughs, not yet clothed with leaves, were scarcely visible amid the
changeless smile of the laurels. At the distance lay Paris, only to be
known by its innumerable lights. And then I said to myself,

"No, I cannot be an actress; I cannot resign my real self for that
vamped-up hypocrite before the lamps. Out on those stage-robes and
painted cheeks! Out on that simulated utterance of sentiments learned by
rote and practised before the looking-glass till every gesture has its
drill!"

Then I gazed on those stars which provoke our questionings, and return no
answer, till my heart grew full,--so full,--and I bowed my head and wept
like a child.

FROM THE SAME TO THE SAME.

And still no letter from you! I see in the journals that you have left
Nice. Is it that you are too absorbed in your work to have leisure to
write to me? I know you are not ill, for if you were, all Paris would
know of it. All Europe has an interest in your health. Positively I
will write to you no more till a word from yourself bids me do so.

I fear I must give up my solitary walks in the Bois de Boulogne: they
were very dear to me, partly because the quiet path to which I confined
myself was that to which you directed me as the one you habitually
selected when at Paris, and in which you had brooded over and revolved
the loveliest of your romances; and partly because it was there that,
catching, alas! not inspiration but enthusiasm from the genius that had
hallowed the place, and dreaming I might originate music, I nursed my own
aspirations and murmured my own airs. And though so close to that world
of Paris to which all artists must appeal for judgment or audience, the
spot was so undisturbed, so sequestered. But of late that path has lost
its solitude, and therefore its charm.

Six days ago the first person I encountered in my walk was a man whom I
did not then heed. He seemed in thought, or rather in revery, like
myself; we passed each other twice or thrice, and I did not notice
whether he was young or old, tall or short; but he came the next day, and
a third day, and then I saw that he was young, and, in so regarding him,
his eyes became fixed on mine. The fourth day he did not come, but two
other men came, and the look of one was inquisitive and offensive. They
sat themselves down on a bench in the walk, and though I did not seem to
notice them, I hastened home; and the next day, in talking with our kind
Madame Savarin, and alluding to these quiet walks of mine, she hinted,
with the delicacy which is her characteristic, that the customs of Paris
did not allow demoiselles _comme il faut_ to walk alone even in the most
sequestered paths of the Bois.

I begin now to comprehend your disdain of customs which impose chains so
idly galling on the liberty of our sex.

We dined with the Savarins last evening: what a joyous nature he has!
Not reading Latin, I only know Horace by translations, which I am told
are bad; but Savarin seems to me a sort of half Horace,--Horace on his
town-bred side, so playfully well-bred, so good-humoured in his
philosophy, so affectionate to friends, and so biting to foes. But
certainly Savarin could not have lived in a country farm upon endives and
mallows. He is town-bred and Parisian, _jusqu'au bout des ongles_. How
he admires you, and how I love him for it! Only in one thing he
disappoints me there. It is your style that he chiefly praises:
certainly that style is matchless; but style is only the clothing of
thought, and to praise your style seems to me almost as invidious as the
compliment to some perfect beauty, not on her form and face, but on her
taste and dress.

We met at dinner an American and his wife,--a Colonel and Mrs. Morley:
she is delicately handsome, as the American women I have seen generally
are, and with that frank vivacity of manner which distinguishes them from
English women. She seemed to take a fancy to me, and we soon grew very
good friends.

She is the first advocate I have met, except yourself, of that doctrine
upon the rights of Women, of which one reads more in the journals than
one hears discussed in salons. Naturally enough I felt great interest in
that subject, more especially since my rambles in the Bois were
forbidden; and as long as she declaimed on the hard fate of the women
who, feeling within them powers that struggle for air and light beyond
the close precinct of household duties, find themselves restricted from
fair rivalry with men in such fields of knowledge and toil and glory as
men since the world began have appropriated to themselves, I need not say
that I went with her cordially: you can guess that by my former letters.
But when she entered into the detailed catalogue of our exact wrongs and
our exact rights, I felt all the pusillanimity of my sex and shrank back
in terror.

Her husband, joining us when she was in full tide of eloquence, smiled at
me with a kind of saturnine mirth. "Mademoiselle, don't believe a word
she says: it is only tall talk! In America the women are absolute
tyrants, and it is I who, in concert with my oppressed countrymen, am
going in for a platform agitation to restore the Rights of Men."

Upon this there was a lively battle of words between the spouses, in
which, I must own, I thought the lady was decidedly worsted.

No, Eulalie, I see nothing in these schemes for altering our relations
towards the other sex which would improve our condition. The
inequalities we suffer are not imposed by law,--not even by convention:
they are imposed by nature.

Eulalie, you have had an experience unknown to me: you have loved. In
that day did you,--you, round whom poets and sages and statesmen gather,
listening to your words as to an oracle,--did you feel that your pride of
genius had gone out from you, that your ambition lived in whom you loved,
that his smile was more to you than the applause of a world?

I feel as if love in a woman must destroy her rights of equality, that it
gives to her a sovereign even in one who would be inferior to herself if
her love did not glorify and crown him. Ah! if I could but merge this
terrible egotism which oppresses me, into the being of some one who is
what I would wish to be were I man! I would not ask him to achieve fame.
Enough if I felt that he was worthy of it, and happier methinks to
console him when he failed than to triumph with him when he won. Tell
me, have you felt this? When you loved did you stoop as to a slave, or
did you bow down as to a master?

FROM MADAME DE GRANTMESNIL TO ISAURA CICOGNA.

_Chere enfant_,--All your four letters have reached me the same day. In
one of my sudden whims I set off with a few friends on a rapid tour along
the Riviera to Genoa, thence to Turin on to Milan. Not knowing where we
should rest even for a day, my letters were not forwarded.

I came back to Nice yesterday, consoled for all fatigues in having
insured that accuracy in description of localities which my work
necessitates.

You are, my poor child, in that revolutionary crisis through which genius
passes in youth before it knows its own self, and longs vaguely to do or
to be a something other than it has done or has been before. For, not to
be unjust to your own powers, genius you have,--that inborn undefinable
essence, including talent, and yet distinct from it. Genius you have,
but genius unconcentrated, undisciplined. I see, though you are too
diffident to say so openly, that you shrink from the fame of singer,
because, fevered by your reading, you would fain aspire to the thorny
crown of author. I echo the hard saying of the Maestro: I should be your
worst enemy did I encourage you to forsake a career in which a dazzling
success is so assured, for one in which, if it were your true vocation,
you would not ask whether you were fit for it; you would be impelled to
it by the terrible star which presides over the birth of poets.

Have you, who are so naturally observant, and of late have become so
reflective, never remarked that authors, however absorbed in their own
craft, do not wish their children to adopt it? The most successful
author is perhaps the last person to whom neophytes should come for
encouragement. This I think is not the case with the cultivators of the
sister arts.

The painter, the sculptor, the musician, seem disposed to invite
disciples and welcome acolytes. As for those engaged in the practical
affairs of life, fathers mostly wish their sons to be as they have been.

The politician, the lawyer, the merchant, each says to his children,
"Follow my steps." All parents in practical life would at least agree
in this,--they would not wish their sons to be poets. There must be some
sound cause in the world's philosophy for this general concurrence of
digression from a road of which the travellers themselves say to those
whom they love best, "Beware!"

Romance in youth is, if rightly understood, the happiest nutriment of
wisdom in after-years; but I would never invite any one to look upon the
romance of youth as a thing

"To case in periods and embalm in ink."

Enfant, have you need of a publisher to create romance? Is it not in
yourself? Do not imagine that genius requires for its enjoyment the
scratch of the pen and the types of the printer. Do not suppose that the
poet, the romancier, is most poetic, most romantic, when he is striving,
struggling, labouring, to check the rush of his ideas, and materialize
the images which visit him as souls into such tangible likenesses of
flesh and blood that the highest compliment a reader can bestow on them
is to say that they are lifelike: No: the poet's real delight is not in
the mechanism of composing; the best part of that delight is in the
sympathies he has established with innumerable modifications of life and
form, and art and Nature, sympathies which are often found equally keen
in those who have not the same gift of language. The poet is but the
interpreter. What of?--Truths in the hearts of others. He utters what
they feel. Is the joy in the utterance? Nay, it is in the feeling
itself. So, my dear, dark-bright child of song, when I bade thee open,
out of the beaten thoroughfare, paths into the meads and river-banks at
either side of the formal hedgerows, rightly dost thou add that I
enjoined thee to make thine art thy companion. In the culture of that
art for which you are so eminently gifted, you will find the ideal life
ever beside the real. Are you not ashamed to tell me that in that art
you do but utter the thoughts of others? You utter them in music;
through the music you not only give to the thoughts a new character, but
you make them reproductive of fresh thoughts in your audience.

You said very truly that you found in composing you could put into music
thoughts which you could not put into words. That is the peculiar
distinction of music. No genuine musician can explain in words exactly
what he means to convey in his music.

How little a libretto interprets an opera; how little we care even to
read it! It is the music that speaks to us; and how?--Through the human
voice. We do not notice how poor are the words which the voice warbles.
It is the voice itself interpreting the soul of the musician which
enchants and enthralls us. And you who have that voice pretend to
despise the gift. What! despise the power of communicating delight!--the
power that we authors envy; and rarely, if ever, can we give delight with
so little alloy as the singer.

And when an audience disperses, can you guess what griefs the singer
may have comforted? what hard hearts he may have softened? what high
thoughts he may have awakened?

You say, "Out on the vamped-up hypocrite! Out on the stage-robes and
painted cheeks!"

I say, "Out on the morbid spirit which so cynically regards the mere
details by which a whole effect on the minds and hearts and souls of
races and nations can be produced!"

There, have I scolded you sufficiently? I should scold you more, if I
did not see in the affluence of your youth and your intellect the cause
of your restlessness. Riches are always restless. It is only to poverty
that the gods give content.

You question me about love; you ask if I have ever bowed to a master,
ever merged my life in another's: expect no answer on this from me.
Circe herself could give no answer to the simplest maid, who, never
having loved, asks, "What is love?"

In the history of the passions each human heart is a world in itself; its
experience profits no others. In no two lives does love play the same
part or bequeath the same record.

I know not whether I am glad or sorry that the word "love" now falls on
my ear with a sound as slight and as faint as the dropping of a leaf in
autumn may fall on thine.

I volunteer but this lesson, the wisest I can give, if thou canst
understand it: as I bade thee take art into thy life, so learn to look on
life itself as an art. Thou couldst discover the charm in Tasso; thou
couldst perceive that the requisite of all art, that which pleases, is in
the harmony of proportion. We lose sight of beauty if we exaggerate the
feature most beautiful.

Love proportioned adorns the homeliest existence; love disproportioned
deforms the fairest.

Alas! wilt thou remember this warning when the time comes in which it may
be needed?

E----- G-------.

BOOK II.

CHAPTER I.

It is several weeks after the date of the last chapter; the lime-trees in
the Tuileries are clothed in green.

In a somewhat spacious apartment on the ground-floor in the quiet
locality of the Rue d'Anjou, a man was seated, very still and evidently
absorbed in deep thought, before a writing-table placed close to the
window.

Seen thus, there was an expression of great power both of intellect and
of character in a face which, in ordinary social commune, might rather be
noticeable for an aspect of hardy frankness, suiting well with the clear-
cut, handsome profile, and the rich dark auburn hair, waving carelessly
over one of those broad open foreheads, which, according to an old
writer, seem the "frontispiece of a temple dedicated to Honour."

The forehead, indeed, was the man's most remarkable feature. It could
not but prepossess the beholder. When, in private theatricals, he had
need to alter the character of his countenance, he did it effectually,
merely by forcing down his hair till it reached his eyebrows. He no
longer then looked like the same man.

The person I describe has been already introduced to the reader as Graham
Vane. But perhaps this is the fit occasion to enter into some such
details as to his parentage and position as may make the introduction
more satisfactory and complete.

His father, the representative of a very ancient family, came into
possession, after a long minority, of what may be called a fair squire's
estate, and about half a million in moneyed investments, inherited on the
female side. Both land and money were absolutely at his disposal,
unencumbered by entail or settlement. He was a man of a brilliant,
irregular genius, of princely generosity, of splendid taste, of a
gorgeous kind of pride closely allied to a masculine kind of vanity. As
soon as he was of age he began to build, converting his squire's hall
into a ducal palace. He then stood for the county; and in days before
the first Reform Bill, when a county election was to the estate of a
candidate what a long war is to the debt of a nation. He won the
election; he obtained early successes in Parliament. It was said by good
authorities in political circles that, if he chose, he might aspire to
lead his party, and ultimately to hold the first rank in the government
of his country.

That may or may not be true; but certainly he did not choose to take the
trouble necessary for such an ambition. He was too fond of pleasure, of
luxury, of pomp. He kept a famous stud of racers and hunters. He was a
munificent patron of art. His establishments, his entertainments, were
on a par with those of the great noble who represented the loftiest (Mr.
Vane would not own it to be the eldest) branch of his genealogical tree.

He became indifferent to political contests, indolent in his attendance
at the House, speaking seldom, not at great length nor with much
preparation, but with power and fire, originality and genius; so that
he was not only effective as an orator, but combining with eloquence
advantages of birth, person, station, the reputation of patriotic
independence, and genial attributes of character, he was an authority
of weight in the scales of party.

This gentleman, at the age of forty, married the dowerless daughter of a
poor but distinguished naval officer, of noble family, first cousin to
the Duke of Alton.

He settled on her a suitable jointure, but declined to tie up any portion
of his property for the benefit of children by the marriage. He declared
that so much of his fortune was invested either in mines, the produce of
which was extremely fluctuating, or in various funds, over rapid
transfers in which it was his amusement and his interest to have control,
unchecked by reference to trustees, that entails and settlements on
children were an inconvenience he declined to incur.

Besides, he held notions of his own as to the wisdom of keeping children
dependent on their father. "What numbers of young men," said he, "are
ruined in character and in fortune by knowing that when their father dies
they are certain of the same provision, no matter how they displease him;
and in the meanwhile forestalling that provision by recourse to usurers."
These arguments might not have prevailed over the bride's father a year
or two later, when, by the death of intervening kinsmen, he became Duke
of Alton; but in his then circumstances the marriage itself was so much
beyond the expectations which the portionless daughter of a sea-captain
has the right to form that Mr. Vane had it all his own way, and he
remained absolute master of his whole fortune, save of that part of his
landed estate on which his wife's jointure was settled; and even from
this incumbrance he was very soon freed. His wife died in the second
year of marriage, leaving an only son,--Graham. He grieved for her loss
with all the passion of an impressionable, ardent, and powerful nature.
Then for a while he sought distraction to his sorrow by throwing himself
into public life with a devoted energy lie had not previously displayed.

His speeches served to bring his party into power, and he yielded, though
reluctantly, to the unanimous demand of that party that he should accept
one of the highest offices in the new Cabinet. He acquitted himself well
as an administrator, but declared, no doubt honestly, that he felt like
Sinbad released from the old man on his back, when, a year or two
afterwards, he went out of office with his party. No persuasions could
induce him to come in again; nor did he ever again take a very active
part in debate. "No," said he, "I was born to the freedom of a private
gentleman: intolerable to me is the thraldom of a public servant. But I
will bring up my son so that he may acquit the debt which I decline to
pay to my country." There he kept his word. Graham had been carefully
educated for public life, the ambition for it dinned into his ear from
childhood. In his school vacations his father made him learn and declaim
chosen specimens of masculine oratory; engaged an eminent actor to give
him lessons in elocution; bade him frequent theatres, and study there the
effect which words derive from looks and gesture; encouraged him to take
part himself in private theatricals. To all this the boy lent his mind
with delight. He had the orator's inborn temperament; quick, yet
imaginative, and loving the sport of rivalry and contest. Being also, in
his boyish years, good-humoured and joyous, he was not more a favourite
with the masters in the schoolroom than with the boys in the play-ground.
Leaving Eton at seventeen, he then entered at Cambridge, and became, in
his first term, the most popular speaker at the Union.

But his father cut short his academical career, and decided, for reasons
of his own, to place him at once in diplomacy. He was attached to the
Embassy at Paris, and partook of the pleasures and dissipations of that
metropolis too keenly to retain much of the sterner ambition to which he
had before devoted himself. Becoming one of the spoiled darlings of
fashion, there was great danger that his character would relax into the
easy grace of the Epicurean, when all such loiterings in the Rose Garden
were brought to abrupt close by a rude and terrible change in his
fortunes.

His father was killed by a fall from his horse in hunting; and when his
affairs were investigated, they were found to be hopelessly involved:
apparently the assets would not suffice for the debts. The elder Vane
himself was probably not aware of the extent of his liabilities. He had
never wanted ready money to the last. He could always obtain that from a
money-lender, or from the sale of his funded investments. But it became
obvious, on examining his papers, that he knew at least how impaired
would be the heritage he should bequeath to a son whom he idolized. For
that reason he had given Graham a profession in diplomacy, and for that
reason he had privately applied to the Ministry for the Viceroyalty of
India, in the event of its speedy vacancy. He was eminent enough not to
anticipate refusal, and with economy in that lucrative post much of his
pecuniary difficulties might have been redeemed, and at least an
independent provision secured for his son.

Graham, like Alain de Rochebriant, allowed no reproach on his father's
memory; indeed, with more reason than Alain, for the elder Vane's fortune
had at least gone on no mean and frivolous dissipation.

It had lavished itself on encouragement to art, on great objects of
public beneficence, on public-spirited aid of political objects; and even
in more selfish enjoyments there was a certain grandeur in his princely
hospitalities, in his munificent generosity, in a warm-hearted
carelessness for money. No indulgence in petty follies or degrading
vices aggravated the offence of the magnificent squanderer.

"Let me look on my loss of fortune as a gain to myself," said Graham,
manfully. "Had I been a rich man, my experience of Paris tells me that I
should most likely have been a very idle one. Now that I have no gold, I
must dig in myself for iron."

The man to whom he said this was an uncle-in-law,--if I may use that
phrase,--the Right Hon. Richard King, popularly styled "the blameless
King."

This gentleman had married the sister of Graham's mother, whose loss in
his infancy and boyhood she had tenderly and anxiously sought to supply.
It is impossible to conceive a woman more fitted to invite love and
reverence than was Lady Janet King, her manners were so sweet and gentle,
her whole nature so elevated and pure.

Her father had succeeded to the dukedom when she married Mr. King, and
the alliance was not deemed quite suitable. Still it was not one to
which the Duke would have been fairly justified in refusing his assent.

Mr. King could not indeed boast of noble ancestry, nor was even a landed
proprietor; but he was a not-undistinguished member of Parliament, of
irreproachable character, and ample fortune inherited from a distant
kinsman, who had enriched himself as a merchant. It was on both sides a
marriage of love.

It is popularly said that a man uplifts a wife to his own rank: it as
often happens that a woman uplifts her husband to the dignity of her own
character. Richard King rose greatly in public estimation after his
marriage with Lady Janet.

She united to a sincere piety a very active and a very enlightened
benevolence. She guided his ambition aside from mere party politics into
subjects of social and religious interest, and in devoting himself to
these he achieved a position more popular and more respected than he
could ever have won in the strife of party.

When the Government of which the elder Vane became a leading Minister was
formed, it was considered a great object to secure a name as high in the
religious world, so beloved by the working classes, as that of Richard
King; and he accepted one of those places which, though not in the
cabinet, confers the rank of Privy Councillor.

When that brief-lived Administration ceased, he felt the same sensation
of relief that Vane had felt, and came to the same resolution never again
to accept office, but from different reasons, all of which need not now
be detailed. Amongst them, however, certainly this: he was exceedingly
sensitive to opinion, thin-skinned as to abuse, and very tenacious of the
respect due to his peculiar character of sanctity and philanthropy. He
writhed under every newspaper article that had made "the blameless King"
responsible for the iniquities of the Government to which he belonged.
In the loss of office he seemed to recover his former throne.

Mr. King heard Graham's resolution with a grave approving smile, and his
interest in the young man became greatly increased. He devoted himself
strenuously to the object of saving to Graham some wrecks of his paternal
fortunes, and having a clear head and great experience in the transaction
of business, he succeeded beyond the most sanguine expectations formed by
the family solicitor. A rich manufacturer was found to purchase at a
fancy price the bulk of the estate with the palatial mansion, which the
estate alone could never have sufficed to maintain with suitable
establishments.

So that when all debts were paid, Graham found himself in possession of a
clear income of about L500 a year, invested in a mortgage secured on a
part of the hereditary lands, on which was seated an old hunting-lodge
bought by a brewer.

With this portion of the property Graham parted very reluctantly. It was
situated amid the most picturesque scenery on the estate, and the lodge
itself was a remnant of the original residence of his ancestors before it
had been abandoned for that which, built in the reign of Elizabeth, had
been expanded into a Trenthain-like palace by the last owner.

But Mr. King's argument reconciled him to the sacrifice. "I can manage,"
said the prudent adviser, "if you insist on it, to retain that remnant of
the hereditary estate which you are so loath to part with. But how? by
mortgaging it to an extent that will scarcely leave you L50. a year net
from the rents. This is not all. Your mind will then be distracted from
the large object of a career to the small object of retaining a few
family acres; you will be constantly hampered by private anxieties and
fears; you could do nothing for the benefit of those around you,--could
not repair a farmhouse for a better class of tenant, could not rebuild a
labourer's dilapidated cottage. Give up an idea that might be very well
for a man whose sole ambition was to remain a squire, however beggarly.
Launch yourself into the larger world of metropolitan life with energies
wholly unshackled, a mind wholly undisturbed, and secure of an income
which, however modest, is equal to that of most young men who enter that
world as your equals."

Graham was convinced, and yielded, though with a bitter pang. It is hard
for a man whose fathers have lived on the soil to give up all trace of
their whereabouts. But none saw in him any morbid consciousness of
change of fortune, when, a year after his father's death, he reassumed
his place in society. If before courted for his expectations, he was
still courted for himself; by many of the great who had loved his father,
perhaps even courted more.

He resigned the diplomatic career, not merely because the rise in that
profession is slow, and in the intermediate steps the chances of
distinction are slight and few, but more because he desired to cast his
lot in the home country, and regarded the courts of other lands as exile.

It was not true, however, as Lemercier had stated on report, that he
lived on his pen. Curbing all his old extravagant tastes, L500 a year
amply supplied his wants. But he had by his pen gained distinction, and
created great belief in his abilities for a public career. He had
written critical articles, read with much praise, in periodicals of
authority, and had published one or two essays on political questions
which had created yet more sensation. It was only the graver literature,
connected more or less with his ultimate object of a public career, in
which he had thus evinced his talents of composition. Such writings were
not of a nature to bring him much money, but they gave him a definite and
solid station. In the old time, before the first Reform Bill, his
reputation would have secured him at once a seat in Parliament; but the
ancient nurseries of statesmen are gone, and their place is not supplied.

He had been invited, however, to stand for more than one large and
populous borough, with very fair prospects of success; and, whatever the
expense, Mr. King had offered to defray it. But Graham would not have
incurred the latter obligation; and when he learned the pledges which his
supporters would have exacted, he would not have stood if success had
been certain and the cost nothing. "I cannot," he said to his friends,
"go into the consideration of what is best for the country with my
thoughts manacled; and I cannot be both representative and slave of the
greatest ignorance of the greatest number. I bide my time, and meanwhile
I prefer to write as I please, rather than vote as I don't please."

Three years went by, passed chiefly in England, partly in travel; and at
the age of thirty, Graham Vane was still one of those of whom admirers
say, "He will be a great man some day;" and detractors reply, "Some day
seems a long way off."

The same fastidiousness which had operated against that entrance into
Parliament, to which his ambition not the less steadily adapted itself,
had kept him free from the perils of wedlock. In his heart he yearned
for love and domestic life, but he had hitherto met with no one who
realized the ideal he had formed. With his person, his accomplishments,
his connections, and his repute, he might have made many an advantageous
marriage. But somehow or other the charm vanished from a fair face, if
the shadow of a money-bag fell on it; on the other hand, his ambition
occupied so large a share in his thoughts that he would have fled in time
from the temptation of a marriage that would have overweighted him beyond
the chance of rising. Added to all, he desired in a wife an intellect
that, if not equal to his own, could become so by sympathy,--a union of
high culture and noble aspiration, and yet of loving womanly sweetness
which a man seldom finds out of books; and when he does find it, perhaps
it does not wear the sort of face that he fancies. Be that as it may,
Graham was still unmarried and heart-whole.

And now a new change in his life befell him. Lady Janet died of a fever
contracted in her habitual rounds of charity among the houses of the
poor. She had been to him as the most tender mother, and a lovelier soul
than hers never alighted on the earth. His grief was intense; but what
was her husband's?--one of those griefs that kill.

To the side of Richard King his Janet had been as the guardian angel.
His love for her was almost worship: with her, every object in a life
hitherto so active and useful seemed gone. He evinced no noisy passion
of sorrow. He shut himself up, and refused to see even Graham. But
after some weeks had passed, he admitted the clergyman in whom on
spiritual matters he habitually confided, and seemed consoled by the
visits; then he sent for his lawyer and made his will; after which he
allowed Graham to call on him daily, on the condition that there should
be no reference to his loss. He spoke to the young man on other
subjects, rather drawing him out about himself, sounding his opinion on
various grave matters, watching his face while he questioned, as if
seeking to dive into his heart, and sometimes pathetically sinking into
silence, broken but by sighs. So it went on for a few more weeks; then
he took the advice of his physician to seek change of air and scene.
He went away alone, without even a servant, not leaving word where he had
gone. After a little while he returned, more ailing, more broken than
before. One morning he was found insensible,--stricken by paralysis.
He regained consciousness, and even for some days rallied strength.
He might have recovered, but he seemed as if he tacitly refused to live.
He expired at last, peacefully, in Graham's arms.

At the opening of his will it was found that he had left Graham his sole
heir and executor. Deducting government duties, legacies to servants,
and donations to public charities, the sum thus bequeathed to his lost
wife's nephew was two hundred and twenty thousand pounds.

With such a fortune, opening indeed was made for an ambition so long
obstructed. But Graham affected no change in his mode of life; he still
retained his modest bachelor's apartments, engaged no servants, bought no
horses, in no way exceeded the income he had posesssed before. He
seemed, indeed, depressed rather than elated by the succession to a
wealth which he had never anticipated.

Two children had been born from the marriage of Richard King: they had
died young, it is true, but Lady Janet at the time of her own decease was
not too advanced in years for the reasonable expectation of other
offspring; and even after Richard King became a widower, he had given to
Graham no hint of his testamentary dispositions. The young man was no
blood-relation to him, and naturally supposed that such relations would
become the heirs. But in truth the deceased seemed to have no blood-
relations: none had ever been known to visit him; none raised a voice to
question the justice of his will.

Lady Janet had been buried at Kensal Green; her husband's remains were
placed in the same vault.

For days and days Graham went his way lonelily to the cemetery. He might
be seen standing motionless by that tomb, with tears rolling down his
cheeks; yet his was not a weak nature,--not one of those that love
indulgence of irremediable grief. On the contrary, people who did not
know him well said "that he had more head than heart," and the character
of his pursuits, as of his writings, was certainly not that of a
sentimentalist. He had not thus visited the tomb till Richard King had
been placed within it. Yet his love for his aunt was unspeakably greater
than that which he could have felt for her husband. Was it, then, the
husband that he so much more acutely mourned; or was there something
that, since the husband's death, had deepened his reverence for the
memory of her whom he had not only loved as a mother, but honoured as a
saint?

These visits to the cemetery did not cease till Graham was confined to
his bed by a very grave illness,--the only one he had ever known. His
physician said it was nervous fever, and occasioned by moral shock or
excitement; it was attended with delirium. His recovery was slow, and
when it was sufficiently completed he quitted England; and we find him
now, with his mind composed, his strength restored, and his spirits
braced, in that gay city of Paris; hiding, perhaps, some earnest purpose
amid his participation in its holiday enjoyments. He is now, as I have
said, seated before his writing-table in deep thought. He takes up a
letter which he had already glanced over hastily, and reperuses it with
more care.

The letter is from his cousin, the Duke of Alton, who had succeeded a few
years since to the family honours,--an able man, with no small degree of
information, an ardent politician, but of very rational and temperate
opinions; too much occupied by the cares of a princely estate to covet
office for himself; too sincere a patriot not to desire office for those
to whose hands he thought the country might be most safely entrusted; an
intimate friend of Graham's. The contents of the letter are these:--

MY DEAR GRAHAM,--I trust that you will welcome the brilliant opening
into public life which these lines are intended to announce to you.
Vavasour has just been with me to say that he intends to resign his
seat for the county when Parliament meets, and agreeing with me that
there is no one so fit to succeed him as yourself, he suggests the
keeping his intention secret until you have arranged your committee
and are prepared to take the field. You cannot hope to escape a
contest; but I have examined the Register, and the party has gained
rather than lost since the last election, when Vavasour was so
triumphantly returned. The expenses for this county, where there
are so many outvoters to bring up, and so many agents to retain, are
always large in comparison with some other counties; but that
consideration is all in your favour, for it deters Squire Hunston,
the only man who could beat you, from starting; and to your
resources a thousand pounds more or less are a trifle not worth
discussing. You know how difficult it is nowadays to find a seat
for a man of moderate opinions like yours and mine. Our county
would exactly suit you. The constituency is so evenly divided
between the urban and rural populations, that its representative
must fairly consult the interests of both. He can be neither an
ultra-Tory nor a violent Radical. He is left to the enviable
freedom, to which you say you aspire, of considering what is best
for the country as a whole.

Do not lose so rare an opportunity. There is but one drawback to
your triumphant candidature. It will be said that you have no
longer an acre in the county in which the Vanes have been settled so
long. That drawback can be removed. It is true that you can never
hope to buy back the estates which you were compelled to sell at
your father's death: the old manufacturer gripes them too firmly to
loosen his hold; and after all, even were your income double what it
is, you would be overhoused in the vast pile in which your father
buried so large a share of his fortune. But that beautiful old
hunting-lodge, the Stamm Schloss of your family, with the adjacent
farms, can be now repurchased very reasonably. The brewer who
bought them is afflicted with an extravagant son, whom he placed in
the--Hussars, and will gladly sell the property for L5,000 more than
he gave: well worth the difference, as he has improved the farm-
buildings and raised the rental. I think, in addition to the sum
you have on mortgage, L3,000 will be accepted, and as a mere
investment pay you nearly three per cent. But to you it is worth
more than double the money; it once more identifies your ancient
name with the county. You would be a greater personage with that
moderate holding in the district in which your race took root, and
on which your father's genius threw such a lustre, than you would be
if you invested all your wealth in a county in which every squire
and farmer would call you "the new man." Pray think over this most
seriously, and instruct your solicitor to open negotiations with the
brewer at once. But rather put yourself into the train, and come
back to England straight to me. I will ask Vavasour to meet you.
What news from Paris? Is the Emperor as ill as the papers
insinuate? And is the revolutionary party gaining ground?

Your affectionate cousin,

ALTON.

As he put down this letter, Graham heaved a short impatient sigh.

"The old Stamm Schloss," he muttered,--"a foot on the old soil once more!
and an entrance into the great arena with hands unfettered. Is it
possible!--is it?--is it?"

At this moment the door-bell of the apartment rang, and a servant whom
Graham had hired at Paris as a _laquais de place_ announced "Ce
Monsieur."

Graham hurried the letter into his portfolio, and said, "You mean the
person to whom I am always at home?"

"The same, Monsieur."

"Admit him, of course."

There entered a wonderfully thin man, middle-aged, clothed in black, his
face cleanly shaven, his hair cut very short, with one of those faces
which, to use a French expression, say "nothing." It was absolutely
without expression: it had not even, despite its thinness, one salient
feature. If you had found yourself anywhere seated next to that man,
your eye would have passed him over as too insignificant to notice; if at
a cafe, you would have gone on talking to your friend without lowering
your voice. What mattered it whether a _bete_ like that overheard or
not? Had you been asked to guess his calling and station, you might have
said, minutely observing the freshness of his clothes and the undeniable
respectability of his _tout ensemble_, "He must be well off, and with no
care for customers on his mind,--a ci-devant chandler who has retired on
a legacy."

Graham rose at the entrance of his visitor, motioned him courteously to a
seat beside him, and waiting till the _laquais_ had vanished, then asked,
"What news?"

"None, I fear, that will satisfy Monsieur. I have certainly hunted out,
since I had last the honour to see you, no less than four ladies of the
name of Duval, but only one of them took that name from her parents, and
was also christened Louise."

"Ah--Louise!"

"Yes, the daughter of a perfumer, aged twenty-eight. She, therefore, is
not the Louise you seek. Permit me to refer to your instructions." Here
M. Renard took out a note-book, turned over the leaves, and resumed,
"Wanted, Louise Duval, daughter of Auguste Duval, a French drawing-
master, who lived for many years at Tours, removed to Paris in 1845,
lived at No. 12, Rue de S---- at Paris for some years, but afterwards
moved to a different guartier of the town, and died 1848, in Rue I----,
No. 39. Shortly after his death, his daughter Louise left that lodging,
and could not be traced. In 1849 official documents reporting her death
were forwarded from Munich to a person (a friend of yours, Monsieur).
Death, of course, taken for granted; but nearly five years afterwards,
this very person encountered the said Louise Duval at Aix-la-Chapelle,
and never heard nor saw more of her. Demande submitted, to find out said
Louise Duval or any children of hers born in 1848-9; supposed in 1852-3
to have one child, a girl, between four and five years old. Is that
right, Monsieur?"

"Quite right."

"And this is the whole information given to me. Monsieur on giving it
asked me if I thought it desirable that he should commence inquiries at
Aix-la-Chapelle, where Louise Duval was last seen by the person
interested to discover her. I reply, No; pains thrown away. Aix-la-
Chapelle is not a place where any Frenchwoman not settled there by
marriage would remain. Nor does it seem probable that the said Duval
would venture to select for her residence Munich, a city in which she had
contrived to obtain certificates of her death. A Frenchwoman who has
once known Paris always wants to get back to it; especially, Monsieur, if
she has the beauty which you assign to this lady. I therefore suggested
that our inquiries should commence in this capital. Monsieur agreed with
me, and I did not grudge the time necessary for investigation."

"You were most obliging. Still I am beginning to be impatient if time is
to be thrown away."

"Naturally. Permit me to return to my notes. Monsieur informs me that
twenty-one years ago, in 1848, the Parisian police were instructed to
find out this lady and failed, but gave hopes of discovering her through
her relations. He asks me to refer to our archives; I tell him that is
no use. However, in order to oblige him, I do so. No trace of such
inquiry: it must have been, as Monsieur led me to suppose, a strictly
private one, unconnected with crime or with politics; and as I have the
honour to tell Monsieur, no record of such investigations is preserved in
our office. Great scandal would there be, and injury to the peace of
families, if we preserved the results of private inquiries intrusted to
us--by absurdly jealous husbands, for instance. Honour,--Monsieur,
honour forbids it. Next I suggest to Monsieur that his simplest plan
would be an advertisement in the French journals, stating, if I
understand him right, that it is for the pecuniary interest of Madame or
Mademoiselle Duval, daughter of Auguste Duval, _artiste en dessin_, to
come forward. Monsieur objects to that."

"I object to it extremely; as I have told you, this is a strictly
confidential inquiry; and an advertisement which in all likelihood would
be practically useless (it proved to be so in a former inquiry) would not
be resorted to unless all else failed, and even then with reluctance."

"Quite so. Accordingly, Monsieur delegates to me, who have been
recommended to him as the best person he can employ in that department
of our police which is not connected with crime or political
surveillance, a task the most difficult. I have, through strictly
private investigations, to discover the address and prove the identity
of a lady bearing a name among the most common in France, and of whom
nothing has been heard for fifteen years, and then at so migratory an
_endroit_ as Aix-la-Chapelle. You will not or cannot inform me if since
that time the lady has changed her name by marriage."

"I have no reason to think that she has; and there are reasons against
the supposition that she married after 1849."

"Permit me to observe that the more details of information Monsieur can
give me, the easier my task of research will be."

"I have given you all the details I can, and, aware of the difficulty of
tracing a person with a name so much the reverse of singular, I adopted
your advice in our first interview, of asking some Parisian friend of
mine, with a large acquaintance in the miscellaneous societies of your
capital, to inform me of any ladies of that name whom he might chance to
encounter; and he, like you, has lighted upon one or two, who alas!
resemble the right one in name and nothing more."

"You will do wisely to keep him on the watch as well as myself. If it
were but a murderess or a political incendiary, then you might trust
exclusively to the enlightenment of our corps, but this seems an affair
of sentiment, Monsieur. Sentiment is not in our way. Seek the trace of
that in the haunts of pleasure."

M. Renard, having thus poetically delivered himself of that philosophical
dogma, rose to depart.

Graham slipped into his hand a bank-note of sufficient value to justify
the profound bow he received in return.

When M. Renard had gone, Graham heaved another impatient sigh, and said
to himself, "No, it is not possible,--at least not yet."

Then, compressing his lips as a man who forces himself to something he
dislikes, he dipped his pen into the inkstand, and wrote rapidly thus to
his kinsman:

MY DEAR COUSIN,--I lose not a post in replying to your kind and
considerate letter. It is not in my power at present to return to
England. I need not say how fondly I cherish the hope of
representing the dear old county some day. If Vavasour could be
induced to defer his resignation of the seat for another session, or
at least for six or seven months, why then I might be free to avail
myself of the opening; at present I am not. Meanwhile I am sorely
tempted to buy back the old Lodge; probably the brewer would allow
me to leave on mortgage the sum I myself have on the property, and a
few additional thousands. I have reasons for not wishing to
transfer at present much of the money now invested in the Funds. I
will consider this point, which probably does not press.

I reserve all Paris news till my next; and begging you to forgive so
curt and unsatisfactory a reply to a letter so important that it
excites me more than I like to own, believe me your affectionate
friend and cousin,

GRAHAM.

CHAPTER II.

AT about the same hour on the same day in which the Englishman held the
conference with the Parisian detective just related, the Marquis de
Rochebriant found himself by appointment in the _cabinet d'affaires_ of
his _avoue_ M. Gandrin that gentleman had hitherto not found time to give
him a definite opinion as to the case submitted to his judgment. The
_avoue_ received Alain with a kind of forced civility, in which the
natural intelligence of the Marquis, despite his inexperience of life,
discovered embarrassment.

"Monsieur le Marquis," said Gandrin, fidgeting among the papers on his
bureau, "this is a very complicated business. I have given not only my
best attention to it, but to your general interests. To be plain, your
estate, though a fine one, is fearfully encumbered--fearfully--
frightfully."

"Sir," said the Marquis, haughtily, "that is a fact which was never
disguised from you."

"I do not say that it was, Marquis; but I scarcely realized the amount of
the liabilities nor the nature of the property. It will be difficult--
nay, I fear, impossible--to find any capitalist to advance a sum that
will cover the mortgages at an interest less than you now pay. As for
a Company to take the whole trouble off your hands, clear off the
mortgages, manage the forests, develop the fisheries, guarantee you an
adequate income, and at the end of twenty-one years or so render up to
you or your heirs the free enjoyment of an estate thus improved, we must
dismiss that prospect as a wild dream of my good friend M. Hebert.
People in the provinces do dream; in Paris everybody is wide awake."

"Monsieur," said the Marquis, with that inborn imperturbable loftiness
of _sang froid_ which has always in adverse circumstances characterized
the French noblesse, "be kind enough to restore my papers. I see that
you are not the man for me. Allow me only to thank you, and inquire the
amount of my debt for the trouble I have given."

"Perhaps you are quite justified in thinking I am not the man for you,
Monsieur le Marquis; and your papers shall, if you decide on dismissing
me, be returned to you this evening. But as to my accepting remuneration
where I have rendered no service, I request M. le Marquis to put that out
of the question. Considering myself, then, no longer your _avoue_,
do not think I take too great a liberty in volunteering my counsel as
a friend,--or a friend at least to M. Hebert, if you do not vouchsafe
my right so to address yourself."

M. Gandrin spoke with a certain dignity of voice and manner which touched
and softened his listener.

"You make me your debtor far more than I pretend to repay," replied
Alain. "Heaven knows I want a friend, and I will heed with gratitude and
respect all your counsels in that character."

"Plainly and briefly, my advice is this: M. Louvier is the principal
mortgagee. He is among the six richest capitalists of Paris. He does
not, therefore, want money, but, like most self-made men, he is very
accessible to social vanities. He would be proud to think he had
rendered a service to a Rochebriant. Approach him, either through me,
or, far better, at once introduce yourself, and propose to consolidate
all your other liabilities in one mortgage to him, at a rate of interest
lower than that which is now paid to some of the small mortgagees. This
would add considerably to your income and would carry out M. Hebert's
advice."

"But does it not strike you, dear M. Gandrin, that such going cap-in-hand
to one who has power over my fate, while I have none over his, would
scarcely be consistent with my self-respect, not as Rochebriant only,
but as Frenchman?"

"It does not strike me so in the least; at all events, I could make the
proposal on your behalf, without compromising yourself, though I should
be far more sanguine of success if you addressed M. Louvier in person."

"I should nevertheless prefer leaving it in your hands; but even for that
I must take a few days to consider. Of all the mortgagees M. Louvier has
been hitherto the severest and most menacing, the one whom Hebert dreads
the most; and should he become sole mortgagee, my whole estate would pass
to him if, through any succession of bad seasons and failing tenants, the
interest was not punctually paid."

"It could so pass to him now."

"No; for there have been years in which the other mortgagees, who are
Bretons and would be loath to ruin a Rochebriant, have been lenient and
patient."

"If Louvier has not been equally so, it is only because he knew nothing
of you, and your father no doubt had often sorely tasked his endurance.
Come, suppose we manage to break the ice easily. Do me the honour to
dine here to meet him; you will find that he is not an unpleasant man."

The Marquis hesitated, but the thought of the sharp and seemingly
hopeless struggle for the retention of his ancestral home to which he
would be doomed if he returned from Paris unsuccessful in his errand
overmastered his pride. He felt as if that self-conquest was a duty he
owed to the very tombs of his fathers. "I ought not to shrink from the
face of a creditor," said he, smiling somewhat sadly, "and I accept the
proposal you so graciously make."

"You do well, Marquis, and I will write at once to Louvier to ask him to
give me his first disengaged day."

The Marquis had no sooner quitted the house than M. Gandrin opened a door
at the side of his office, and a large portly man strode into the room,--
stride it was rather than step,--firm, self-assured, arrogant, masterful.

"Well, _mon ami_," said this man, taking his stand at the hearth, as a
king might take his stand in the hall of his vassal, "and what says our
_petit muscadin_?"

"He is neither _petit_ nor _muscadin_, Monsieur Louvier," replied
Gandrin, peevishly; "and he will task your powers to get him thoroughly
into your net. But I have persuaded him to meet you here. What day can
you dine with me? I had better ask no one else."

"To-morrow I dine with my friend O-----, to meet the chiefs of the
Opposition," said M. Louvier, with a sort of careless rollicking
pomposity. "Thursday with Pereire; Saturday I entertain at home. Say
Friday. Your hour?"

"Seven."

"Good! Show me those Rochebriant papers again; there is something I had
forgotten to note. Never mind me. Go on with your work as if I were not
here."

Louvier took up the papers, seated himself in an armchair by the
fireplace, stretched out his legs, and read at his ease, but with a very
rapid eye, as a practised lawyer skims through the technical forms of a
case to fasten upon the marrow of it.

"Ah! as I thought. The farms could not pay even the interest on my
present mortgage; the forests come in for that. If a contractor for the
yearly sale of the woods was bankrupt and did not pay, how could I get my
interest? Answer me that, Gandrin."

"Certainly you must run the risk of that chance."

"Of course the chance occurs, and then I foreclose, seize,--Rochebriant
and its _seigneuries_ are mine."

As he spoke he laughed, not sardonically,--a jovial laugh,--and opened
wide, to reshut as in a vice, the strong iron hand which had doubtless
closed over many a man's all.

"Thanks. On Friday, seven o'clock." He tossed the papers back on the
bureau, nodded a royal nod, and strode forth imperiously as he had strode
in.

CHAPTER III.

MEANWHILE the young Marquis pursued his way thoughtfully through the
streets, and entered the Champs Elysees. Since we first, nay, since we
last saw him, he is strikingly improved in outward appearances. He has
unconsciously acquired more of the easy grace of the Parisian in gait and
bearing. You would no longer detect the Provincial--perhaps, however,
because he is now dressed, though very simply, in habiliments that belong
to the style of the day. Rarely among the loungers in the Champs Elysees
could be seen a finer form, a comelier face, an air of more unmistakable
distinction.

The eyes of many a passing fair one gazed on him, admiringly or
coquettishly. But he was still so little the true Parisian that they got
no smile, no look in return. He was wrapped in his own thoughts; was he
thinking of M. Louvier?

He had nearly gained the entrance of the Bois de Boulogne, when he was
accosted by a voice behind, and turning round saw his friend Lemercier
arm-in-arm with Graham Vane.

"Bonjour, Alain," said Lemercier, hooking his disengaged arm into
Rochebriant's. "I suspect we are going the same way."

Alain felt himself change countenance at this conjecture, and replied
coldly, "I think not; I have got to the end of my walk, and shall turn
back to Paris;" addressing himself to the Englishman, he said with formal
politeness, "I regret not to have found you at home when I called some
weeks ago, and no less so to have been out when you had the complaisance
to return my visit."

"At all events," replied the Englishman, "let me not lose the opportunity
of improving our acquaintance which now offers. It is true that our
friend Lemercier, catching sight of me in the Rue de Rivoli, stopped his
coupe and carried me off for a promenade in the Bois. The fineness of
the day tempted us to get out of his carriage as the Bois came in sight.
But if you are going back to Paris I relinquish the Bois and offer myself
as your companion."

Frederic (the name is so familiarly English that the reader might think
me pedantic did I accentuate it as French) looked from one to the other
of his two friends, half amused and half angry.

"And am I to be left alone to achieve a conquest, in which, if I succeed,
I shall change into hate and envy the affection of my two best friends?
Be it so.

"' Un veritable amant ne connait point d'amis.'"

"I do not comprehend your meaning," said the Marquis, with a compressed
lip and a slight frown.

"Bah!" cried Frederic; "come, _franc jeu_; cards on the table. M. Gram
Varn was going into the Bois at my suggestion on the chance of having
another look at the pearl-coloured angel; and you, Rochebriant, can't
deny that you were going into the Bois for the same object."

"One may pardon an _enfant terrible_," said the Englishman, laughing,
"but an _ami terrible_ should be sent to the galleys. Come, Marquis, let
us walk back and submit to our fate. Even were the lady once more
visible, we have no chance of being observed by the side of a Lovelace so
accomplished and so audacious!"

"Adieu, then, recreants: I go alone. Victory or death." The Parisian
beckoned his coachman, entered his carriage, and with a mocking grimace
kissed his hand to the companions thus deserting or deserted.

Rochebriant touched the Englishman's arm, and said, "Do you think that
Lemercier could be impertinent enough to accost that lady?"

"In the first place," returned the Englishman, "Lemercier himself tells
me that the lady has for several weeks relinquished her walks in the
Bois, and the probability is, therefore, that he will not have the
opportunity to accost her. In the next place, it appears that when she
did take her solitary walk, she did not stray far from her carriage, and
was in reach of the protection of her _laquais_ and coachman. But to
speak honestly, do you, who know Lemercier better than I, take him to be
a man who would commit an impertinence to a woman unless there were
_viveurs_ of his own sex to see him do it?"

Alain smiled. "No. Frederic's real nature is an admirable one, and if
he ever do anything that he ought to be ashamed of, 'twill be from the
pride of showing how finely he can do it. Such was his character at
college, and such it still seems at Paris. But it is true that the lady
has forsaken her former walk; at least I--I have not seen her since the
day I first beheld her in company with Frederic. Yet--yet, pardon me,
you were going to the Bois on the chance of seeing her. Perhaps she has
changed the direction of her walk, and--and--"

The Marquis stopped short, stammering and confused.

The Englishman scanned his countenance with the rapid glance of a
practised observer of men and things, and after a short pause said: "If
the lady has selected some other spot for her promenade, I am ignorant of
it; nor have I ever volunteered the chance of meeting with her, since I
learned--first from Lemercier, and afterwards from others--that her
destination is the stage. Let us talk frankly, Marquis. I am accustomed
to take much exercise on foot, and the Bois is my favourite resort: one
day I there found myself in the _allee_ which the lady we speak of used
to select for her promenade, and there saw her. Something in her face
impressed me; how shall I describe the impression? Did you ever open a
poem, a romance, in some style wholly new to you, and before you were
quite certain whether or not its merits justified the interest which the
novelty inspired, you were summoned away, or the book was taken out of
your hands? If so, did you not feel an intellectual longing to have
another glimpse of the book? That illustration describes my impression,
and I own that I twice again went to the same _allee_. The last time I
only caught sight of the young lady as she was getting into her carriage.
As she was then borne away, I perceived one of the custodians of the
Bois; and learned, on questioning him, that the lady was in the habit of
walking always alone in the same _allee_ at the same hour on most fine
days, but that he did not know her name or address. A motive of
curiosity--perhaps an idle one--then made me ask Lemercier, who boasts of
knowing his Paris so intimately, if he could inform me who the lady was.
He undertook to ascertain."

"But," interposed the Marquis, "he did not ascertain who she was; he
only ascertained where she lived, and that she and an elder companion
were Italians;--whom he suspected, without sufficient ground, to be
professional singers."

"True; but since then I ascertained more detailed particulars from two
acquaintances of mine who happen to know her,--M. Savarin, the
distinguished writer, and Mrs. Morley, an accomplished and beautiful
American lady, who is more than an acquaintance. I may boast the honour
of ranking among her friends. As Savarin's villa is at A------, I asked
him incidentally if he knew the fair neighbour whose face had so
attracted me; and Mrs. Morley being present, and overhearing me,
I learned from both what I now repeat to you.

"The young lady is a Signorina Cicogna,--at Paris, exchanging (except
among particular friends), as is not unusual, the outlandish designation
of Signorina for the more conventional one of Mademoiselle. Her father
was a member of the noble Milanese family of the same name, therefore the
young lady is well born. Her father has been long dead; his widow
married again an English gentleman settled in Italy, a scholar and
antiquarian; his name was Selby. This gentleman, also dead, bequeathed
the Signorina a small but sufficient competence. She is now an orphan,
and residing with a companion, a Signora Venosta, who was once a singer
of some repute at the Neapolitan Theatre, in the orchestra of which her
husband was principal performer; but she relinquished the stage several
years ago on becoming a widow, and gave lessons as a teacher. She has
the character of being a scientific musician, and of unblemished private
respectability. Subsequently she was induced to give up general
teaching, and undertake the musical education and the social charge of
the young lady with her. This girl is said to have early given promise
of extraordinary excellence as a singer, and excited great interest among
a coterie of literary critics and musical _cognoscenti_. She was to have
come out at the Theatre of Milan a year or two ago, but her career has
been suspended in consequence of ill-health, for which she is now at
Paris under the care of an English physician, who has made remarkable
cures in all complaints of the respiratory organs. ------, the great
composer, who knows her, says that in expression and feeling she has no
living superior, perhaps no equal since Malibran."

"You seem, dear Monsieur, to have taken much pains to acquire this
information."

"No great pains were necessary; but had they been I might have taken
them, for, as I have owned to you, Mademoiselle Cicogna, while she was
yet a mystery to me, strangely interested my thoughts or my fancies.
That interest has now ceased. The world of actresses and singers lies
apart from mine."

"Yet," said Alain, in a tone of voice that implied doubt, "if I
understand Lemercier aright, you were going with him to the Bois on the
chance of seeing again the lady in whom your interest has ceased."

"Lemercier's account was not strictly accurate. He stopped his carriage
to speak to me on quite another subject, on which I have consulted him,
and then proposed to take me on to the Bois. I assented; and it was not
till we were in the carriage that he suggested the idea of seeing whether
the pearly-robed lady had resumed her walk in the allee. You may judge
how indifferent I was to that chance when I preferred turning back with
you to going on with him. Between you and me, Marquis, to men of our
age, who have the business of life before them, and feel that if there be
aught in which noblesse oblige it is a severe devotion to noble objects,
there is nothing more fatal to such devotion than allowing the heart to
be blown hither and thither at every breeze of mere fancy, and dreaming
ourselves into love with some fair creature whom we never could marry
consistently with the career we have set before our ambition. I could
not marry an actress,--neither, I presume, could the Marquis de
Rochebriant; and the thought of a courtship which excluded the idea of
marriage to a young orphan of name unblemished, of virtue unsuspected,
would certainly not be compatible with 'devotion to noble objects.'"

Alain involuntarily bowed his head in assent to the proposition, and, it
may be, in submission to an implied rebuke.

The two men walked in silence for some minutes, and Graham first spoke,
changing altogether the subject of conversation. "Lemercier tells me you
decline going much into this world of Paris, the capital of capitals,
which appears so irresistibly attractive to us foreigners."

"Possibly; but, to borrow your words, I have the business of life before
me."

"Business is a good safeguard against the temptations to excess in
pleasure, in which Paris abounds. But there is no business which does
not admit of some holiday, and all business necessitates commerce with
mankind. A propos, I was the other evening at the Duchese de
Tarascon's,--a brilliant assembly, filled with ministers, senators, and
courtiers. I heard your name mentioned."

"Mine?"

"Yes; Duplessis, the rising financier--who rather to my surprise was not
only present among these official and decorated celebrities, but
apparently quite at home among them--asked the Duchess if she had not
seen you since your arrival at Paris. She replied, 'No; that though you
were among her nearest connections, you had not called on her;' and bade
Duplessis tell you that you were a monstre for not doing so. Whether or
not Duplessis will take that liberty I know not; but you must pardon me
if I do. She is a very charming woman, full of talent; and that stream
of the world which reflects the stars, with all their mythical influences
on fortune, flows through her salons."

"I am not born under those stars. I am a Legitimist."

"I did not forget your political creed; but in England the leaders of
opposition attend the salons of the Prime Minister. A man is not
supposed to compromise his opinions because he exchanges social
courtesies with those to whom his opinions are hostile. Pray excuse me
if I am indiscreet, I speak as a traveller who asks for information: but
do the Legitimists really believe that they best serve their cause by
declining any mode of competing with its opponents? Would there not be a
fairer chance of the ultimate victory of their principles if they made
their talents and energies individually prominent; if they were known as
skilful generals, practical statesmen, eminent diplomatists, brilliant
writers? Could they combine,--not to sulk and exclude themselves from
the great battle-field of the world, but in their several ways to render
themselves of such use to their country that some day or other, in one of
those revolutionary crises to which France, alas! must long be subjected,
they would find themselves able to turn the scale of undecided councils
and conflicting jealousies."

"Monsieur, we hope for the day when the Divine Disposer of events will
strike into the hearts of our fickle and erring countrymen the conviction
that there will be no settled repose for France save under the sceptre of
her rightful kings. But meanwhile we are,--I see it more clearly since I
have quitted Bretagne,--we are a hopeless minority."

"Does not history tell us that the great changes of the world have been
wrought by minorities,--but on the one condition that the minorities
shall not be hopeless? It is almost the other day that the Bonapartists
were in a minority that their adversaries called hopeless, and the
majority for the Emperor is now so preponderant that I tremble for his
safety. When a majority becomes so vast that intellect disappears in the
crowd, the date of its destruction commences; for by the law of reaction
the minority is installed against it. It is the nature of things that
minorities are always more intellectual than multitudes, and intellect is
ever at work in sapping numerical force. What your party want is hope;
because without hope there is no energy. I remember hearing my father
say that when he met the Count de Chambord at Ems, that illustrious
personage delivered himself of a _belle phrase_ much admired by his
partisans. The Emperor was then President of the Republic, in a very
doubtful and dangerous position. France seemed on the verge of another
convulsion. A certain distinguished politician recommended the Count de
Chambord to hold himself ready to enter at once as a candidate for the
throne. And the Count, with a benignant smile on his handsome face,
answered, 'All wrecks come to the shore: the shore does not go to the
wrecks.'"

"Beautifully said!" exclaimed the Marquis.

"Not if 'Le beau est toujours le vrai.' My father, no inexperienced nor
unwise politician, in repeating the royal words, remarked: 'The fallacy
of the Count's argument is in its metaphor. A man is not a shore. Do
you not think that the seamen on board the wrecks would be more grateful
to him who did not complacently compare himself to a shore, but
considered himself a human being like themselves, and risked his own life
in a boat, even though it were a cockleshell, in the chance of saving
theirs?"

Alain de Rochebriant was a brave man, with that intense sentiment of
patriotism which characterizes Frenchmen of every rank and persuasion,
unless they belong to the Internationalists; and, without pausing to
consider, he cried, "Your father was right."

The Englishman resumed: "Need I say, my dear Marquis, that I am not a
Legitimist? I am not an Imperialist, neither am I an Orleanist nor a
Republican. Between all those political divisions it is for Frenchmen
to make their choice, and for Englishmen to accept for France that
government which France has established. I view things here as a simple
observer. But it strikes me that if I were a Frenchman in your position,
I should think myself unworthy my ancestors if I consented to be an
insignificant looker-on."

"You are not in my position," said the Marquis, half mournfully, half
haughtily, "and you can scarcely judge of it even in imagination."

"I need not much task my imagination; I judge of it by analogy. I was
very much in your position when I entered upon what I venture to call my
career; and it is the curious similarity between us in circumstances,
that made me wish for your friendship when that similarity was made known
to me by Lemercier, who is not less garrulous than the true Parisian
usually is. Permit me to say that, like you, I was reared in some pride
of no inglorious ancestry. I was reared also in the expectation of great
wealth. Those expectations were not realized: my father had the fault of
noble natures,--generosity pushed to imprudence: he died poor and in
debt. You retain the home of your ancestors; I had to resign mine."

The Marquis had felt deeply interested in this narrative, and as Graham
now paused, took his hand and pressed it. "One of our most eminent
personages said to me about that time, 'Whatever a clever man of your age
determines to do or to be, the odds are twenty to one that he has only to
live on in order to do or to be it.' Don't you think he spoke truly? I
think so."

"I scarcely know what to think," said Rochebriant; "I feel as if you had
given me so rough a shake when I was in the midst of a dull dream, that I
am not yet quite sure whether I am asleep or awake."

Just as he said this, and towards the Paris end of the Champs Elysees,
there was a halt, a sensation among the loungers round them; many of them
uncovered in salute.

A man on the younger side of middle age, somewhat inclined to corpulence,
with a very striking countenance, was riding slowly by. He returned the
salutations he received with the careless dignity of a Personage
accustomed to respect, and then reined in his horse by the side of a
barouche, and exchanged some words with a portly gentleman who was its
sole occupant. The loungers, still halting, seemed to contemplate this
parley--between him on horseback and him in the carriage--with very eager
interest. Some put their hands behind their ears and pressed forward, as
if trying to overhear what was said.

"I wonder," quoth Graham, "whether, with all his cleverness, the Prince
has in any way decided what he means to do or to be."

"The Prince!" said Rochebriant, rousing himself from revery; "what
Prince?"

"Do you not recognize him by his wonderful likeness to the first
Napoleon,--him on horseback talking to Louvier, the great financier."

"Is that stout bourgeois in the carriage Louvier,--my mortgagee,
Louvier?"

"Your mortgagee, my dear Marquis? Well, he is rich enough to be a very
lenient one upon pay-day."

"_Hein_!--I doubt his leniency," said Alain. "I have promised my _avoue_
to meet him at dinner. Do you think I did wrong?"

"Wrong! of course not; he is likely to overwhelm you with civilities.
Pray don't refuse if he gives you an invitation to his soiree next
Saturday; I am going to it. One meets there the notabilities most
interesting to study,--artists, authors, politicians, especially those
who call themselves Republicans. He and the Prince agree in one thing;
namely, the cordial reception they give to the men who would destroy the
state of things upon which Prince and financier both thrive. Hillo!
here comes Lemercier on return from the Bois."

Lemercier's _coupe_ stopped beside the footpath. "What tidings of the
_Belle Inconnue_?" asked the Englishman. "None; she was not there. But
I am rewarded: such an adventure! a dame of the _haute volee_; I believe
she is a duchess. She was walking with a lap-dog, a pure Pomeranian. A
strange poodle flew at the Pomeranian, I drove off the poodle, rescued
the Pomeranian, received the most gracious thanks, the sweetest smile:
_femme superbe_, middle aged. I prefer women of forty. _Au revoir_, I am
due at the club."

Alain felt a sensation of relief that Lemercier had not seen the lady in
the pearl-coloured dress, and quitted the Englishman with a lightened
heart.

CHAPTER IV.

"_Piccola, piccola! com e cortese_! another invitation from M. Louvier
for next Saturday,--conversazione." This was said in Italian by an
elderly lady bursting noisily into the room,--elderly, yet with a
youthful expression of face, owing perhaps to a pair of very vivacious
black eyes. She was dressed, after a somewhat slatternly fashion, in a
wrapper of crimson merino much the worse for wear, a blue handkerchief
twisted turban-like round her head, and her feet encased in list
slippers. The person to whom she addressed herself was a young lady with
dark hair, which, despite its evident repugnance, was restrained into
smooth glossy braids over the forehead, and at the crown of the small
graceful head into the simple knot which Horace has described as
"Spartan." Her dress contrasted the speaker's by an exquisite neatness.

We have seen her before as the lady in the pearl-coloured robe; but seen
now at home she looks much younger. She was one of those whom,
encountered in the streets or in society, one might guess to be married,
--probably a young bride; for thus seen there was about her an air of
dignity and of self-possession which suits well with the ideal of chaste
youthful matronage; and in the expression of the face there was a pensive
thoughtfulness beyond her years. But as she now sat by the open window
arranging flowers in a glass bowl, a book lying open on her lap, you
would never have said, "What a handsome woman!" you would have said,
"What a charming girl!" All about her was maidenly, innocent, and fresh.
The dignity of her bearing was lost in household ease, the pensiveness of
her expression in an untroubled serene sweetness.

Perhaps many of my readers may have known friends engaged in some
absorbing cause of thought, and who are in the habit when they go out,
especially if on solitary walks, to take that cause of thought with them.
The friend may be an orator meditating his speech, a poet his verses, a
lawyer a difficult case, a physician an intricate malady. If you have
such a friend, and you observe him thus away from his home, his face will
seem to you older and graver. He is absorbed in the care that weighs on
him. When you see him in a holiday moment at his own fireside, the care
is thrown aside; perhaps he mastered while abroad the difficulty that had
troubled him; he is cheerful, pleasant, sunny. This appears to be very
much the case with persons of genius. When in their own houses we
usually find them very playful and childlike. Most persons of real
genius, whatever they may seem out of doors, are very sweet-tempered at
home, and sweet temper is sympathizing and genial in the intercourse of
private life. Certainly, observing this girl as she now bends over the
flowers, it would be difficult to believe her to be the Isaura Cicogna
whose letters to Madame de Grantinesnil exhibit the doubts and struggles
of an unquiet, discontented, aspiring mind. Only in one or two passages
in those letters would you have guessed at the writer in the girl as we
now see her. It is in those passages where she expresses her love of
harmony, and her repugnance to contest: those were characteristics you
might have read in her face.

Certainly the girl is very lovely: what long dark eyelashes! what soft,
tender, dark-blue eyes! now that she looks up and smiles, what a
bewitching smile it is! by what sudden play of rippling dimples the smile
is enlivened and redoubled! Do you notice one feature? In very showy
beauties it is seldom noticed; but I, being in my way a physiognomist,
consider that it is always worth heeding as an index of character. It is
the ear. Remark how delicately it is formed in her: none of that
heaviness of lobe which is a sure sign of sluggish intellect and coarse
perception. Hers is the artist's ear. Note next those hands: how
beautifully shaped! small, but not doll-like hands,--ready and nimble,
firm and nervous hands, that could work for a helpmate. By no means very
white, still less red, but somewhat embrowned as by the sun, such as you
may see in girls reared in southern climes, and in her perhaps betokening
an impulsive character which had not accustomed itself, when at sport in
the open air, to the thraldom of gloves,--very impulsive people even in
cold climates seldom do.

In conveying to us by a few bold strokes an idea of the sensitive, quick-
moved, warm-blooded Henry II., the most impulsive of the Plantagenets,
his contemporary chronicler tells us that rather than imprison those
active hands of his, even in hawking-gloves, he would suffer his falcon
to fix its sharp claws into his wrist. No doubt there is a difference as
to what is befitting between a burly bellicose creature like Henry II.
and a delicate young lady like Isaura Cicogna; and one would not wish to
see those dainty wrists of hers seamed and scarred by a falcon's claws.
But a girl may not be less exquisitely feminine for slight heed of
artificial prettiness. Isaura had no need of pale bloodless hands to
seem one of Nature's highest grade of gentlewomen even to the most
fastidious eyes. About her there was a charm apart from her mere beauty,
and often disturbed instead of heightened by her mere intellect: it
consisted in a combination of exquisite artistic refinement, and of a
generosity of character by which refinement was animated into vigour and
warmth.

The room, which was devoted exclusively to Isaura, had in it much that
spoke of the occupant. That room, when first taken furnished, had a good
deal of the comfortless showiness which belongs to ordinary furnished
apartments in France, especially in the Parisian suburbs, chiefly let
for the summer: thin limp muslin curtains that decline to draw; stiff
mahogany chairs covered with yellow Utrecht velvet; a tall secretaire in
a dark corner; an oval buhl-table set in tawdry ormolu, islanded in the
centre of a poor but gaudy Scotch carpet; and but one other table of dull
walnut-wood, standing clothless before a sofa to match the chairs; the
eternal ormolu clock flanked by the two eternal ormolu candelabra on the
dreary mantelpiece. Some of this garniture had been removed, others
softened into cheeriness and comfort. The room somehow or other--thanks
partly to a very moderate expenditure in pretty twills with pretty
borders, gracefully simple table-covers, with one or two additional small
tables and easy-chairs, two simple vases filled with flowers; thanks
still more to a nameless skill in re-arrangement, and the disposal of the
slight knick-knacks and well-bound volumes, which, even in travelling,
women who have cultivated the pleasures of taste carry about them--had
been coaxed into that quiet harmony, that tone of consistent subdued
colour, which corresponded with the characteristics of the inmate. Most
people might have been puzzled where to place the piano, a semi-grand,
so as not to take up too much space in the little room; but where it was
placed it seemed so at home that you might have supposed the room had
been built for it.

There are two kinds of neatness,--one is too evident, and makes
everything about it seem trite and cold and stiff; and another kind of
neatness disappears from our sight in a satisfied sense of completeness,
--like some exquisite, simple, finished style of writing, an Addison's or
a St. Pierre's.

This last sort of neatness belonged to Isaura, and brought to mind the
well-known line of Catullus when on recrossing his threshold he invokes
its welcome,--a line thus not inelegantly translated by Leigh Hunt,

"Smile every dimple on the cheek of Home."

I entreat the reader's pardon for this long descriptive digression; but
Isaura is one of those characters which are called many-sided, and
therefore not very easy to comprehend. She gives us one side of her
character in her correspondence with Madame de Grantmesnil, and another
side of it in her own home with her Italian companion,--half nurse, half
chaperon.

"Monsieur Louvier is indeed very courteous," said Isaura, looking up from
the flowers with the dimpled smile we have noticed. "But I think, Madre,
that we should do well to stay at home on Saturday,--not peacefully, for
I owe you your revenge at Euchre."

"You can't mean it, Piecola!" exclaimed the Signora, in evident
consternation. "Stay at home!--why stay at home? Euchre is very well
when there is nothing else to do: but change is pleasant; le bon Dieu
likes it,

"'Ne caldo ne gelo
Resta mai in cielo.'

"And such beautiful ices one gets at M. Louvier's! Did you taste the
pistachio ice? What fine rooms, and so well lit up! I adore light. And
the ladies so beautifully dressed: one sees the fashions. Stay at home!
play at Euchre indeed! Piccola, you cannot be so cruel to yourself: you
are young."

"But, dear Madre, just consider; we are invited because we are considered
professional singers: your reputation as such is of course established,--
mine is not; but still I shall be asked to sing, as I was asked before;
and you know Dr. C. forbids me to do so except to a very small audience;
and it is so ungracious always to say 'No;' and besides, did you not
yourself say, when we came away last time from M. Louvier's, that it was
very dull, that you knew nobody, and that the ladies had such superb
toilets that you felt mortified--and--"

"Zitto! zitto! you talk idly, Piccola,--very idly. I was mortified then
in my old black Lyons silk; but have I not bought since then my beautiful
Greek jacket,--scarlet and gold lace? and why should I buy it if I am not
to show it?"

"But, dear Madre, the jacket is certainly very handsome, and will make an
effect in a little dinner at the Savarins or Mrs. Morley's; but in a
great formal reception like M. Louvier's will it not look--"

"Splendid!" interrupted the Signora.

"But _singolare_."

"So much the better; did not that great English Lady wear such a jacket,
and did not every one admire her, _piu tosto invidia the compassione_?"

Isaura sighed. Now the jacket of the Signora was a subject of
disquietude to her friend. It so happened that a young English lady of
the highest rank and the rarest beauty had appeared at M. Louvier's, and
indeed generally in the _beau monde_ of Paris, in a Greek jacket that
became her very much. The jacket had fascinated, at M. Louvier's, the
eyes of the Signora. But of this Isaura was unaware. The Signora, on
returning home from M. Louvier's, had certainly lamented much over the
_mesquin_ appearance of her old-fashioned Italian habiliments compared
with the brilliant toilette of the gay Parisiennes; and Isaura--quite
woman enough to sympathize with woman in such womanly vanities--proposed
the next day to go with the Signora to one of the principal couturieres
of Paris, and adapt the Signora's costume to the fashions of the place.
But the Signora having predetermined on a Greek jacket, and knowing
by instinct that Isaura would be disposed to thwart that splendid
predilection, had artfully suggested that it would be better to go
to the couturiere with Madame Savarin, as being a more experienced
adviser,--and the coupe only held two.

As Madame Savarin was about the same age as the Signora, and dressed as
became her years and in excellent taste, Isaura thought this an admirable
suggestion; and pressing into her chaperon's hand a _billet de banque_
sufficient to re-equip her _cap-a pie_, dismissed the subject from her
mind. But the Signora was much too cunning to submit her passion for the
Greek jacket to the discouraging comments of Madame Savarin.
Monopolizing the _coupe_, she became absolute mistress of the situation.
She went to no fashionable couturiere's. She went to a magasin that she
had seen advertised in the _Petites Afiches_ as supplying superb costumes
for fancy-balls and amateur performers in private theatricals. She
returned home triumphant, with a jacket still more dazzling to the eye
than that of the English lady.

When Isaura first beheld it, she drew back in a sort of superstitious
terror, as of a comet or other blazing portent.

"_Cosa stupenda_!" (stupendous thing!) She might well be dismayed when
the Signora proposed to appear thus attired in M. Louvier's salon. What
might be admired as coquetry of dress in a young beauty of rank so great
that even a vulgarity in her would be called distinguee, was certainly an
audacious challenge of ridicule in the elderly _ci-devant_ music-teacher.

But how could Isaura, how can any one of common humanity, say to a woman
resolved upon wearing a certain dress, "You are not young and handsome
enough for that?" Isaura could only murmur, "For many reasons I would
rather stay at home, dear Madre."

"Ah! I see you are ashamed of me," said the Signora, in softened tones:
"very natural. When the nightingale sings no more, she is only an ugly
brown bird;" and therewith the Signora Venosta seated herself
submissively, and began to cry.

On this Isaura sprang up, wound her arms round the Signora's neck,
soothed her with coaxing, kissed and petted her, and ended by saying, "Of
course we will go;" and, "but let me choose you another dress,--a dark-
green velvet trimmed with blonde: blonde becomes you so well."

"No, no: I hate green velvet; anybody can wear that. Piccola, I am not
clever like thee; I cannot amuse myself like thee with books. I am in a
foreign land. I have a poor head, but I have a big heart" (another burst
of tears); "and that big heart is set on my beautiful Greek jacket."

"Dearest Madre," said Isaura, half weeping too, "forgive me, you are
right. The Greek jacket is splendid; I shall be so pleased to see you
wear it: poor Madre! so pleased to think that in the foreign land you
are not without something that pleases you!"

CHAPTER V.

CONFORMABLY with his engagement to meet M. Louvier, Alain found himself
on the day and at the hour named in M. Gandrin's salon. On this occasion
Madame Gandrin did not appear. Her husband was accustomed to give
_diners d'hommes_. The great man had not yet arrived. "I think,
Marquis," said M. Gandrin, "that you will not regret having followed my
advice: my representations have disposed Louvier to regard you with much
favour, and he is certainly flattered by being permitted to make your
personal acquaintance."

The _avoue_ had scarcely finished this little speech, when M. Louvier was
announced. He entered with a beaming smile, which did not detract from
his imposing presence. His flatterers had told him that he had a look of
Louis Philippe; therefore he had sought to imitate the dress and the
bonhomie of that monarch of the middle class. He wore a wig, elaborately
piled up, and shaped his whiskers in royal harmony with the royal wig.
Above all, he studied that social frankness of manner with which the
able sovereign dispelled awe of his presence or dread of his astuteness.
Decidedly he was a man very pleasant to converse and to deal with--so
long as there seemed to him something to gain and nothing to lose by
being pleasant. He returned Alain's bow by a cordial offer of both
expansive hands, into the grasp of which the hands of the aristocrat
utterly disappeared. "Charmed to make your acquaintance, Marquis; still
more charmed if you will let me be useful during your _sejour_ at Paris.
_Ma foi_, excuse my bluntness, but you are a _fort beau garcon_.
Monsieur your father was a handsome man, but you beat him hollow.
Gandrin, my friend, would not you and I give half our fortunes for one
year of this fine fellow's youth spent at Paris? _Peste_! what love-
letters we should have, with no need to buy them by _billets de banque_!"
Thus he ran on, much to Alain's confusion, till dinner was announced.
Then there was something grandiose in the frank _bourgeois_ style
wherewith he expanded his napkin and twisted one end into his waistcoat;
it was so manly a renunciation of the fashions which a man so _repandu_
in all circles might be supposed to follow,--as if he were both too great
and too much in earnest for such frivolities. He was evidently a sincere
_bon vivant_, and M. Gandrin had no less evidently taken all requisite
pains to gratify his taste. The Montrachet served with the oysters was
of precious vintage; that _vin de madere_ which accompanied the _potage a
la bisque_ would have contented an American. And how radiant became
Louvier's face when amongst the _entrees_ he came upon _laitances de
carpes_! "The best thing in the world," he cried, "and one gets it so
seldom since the old Rocher de Cancale has lost its renown. At private
houses, what does one get now? _blanc de poulet_, flavourless trash.
After all, Gandrin, when we lose the love-letters, it is some consolation
that _laitances de carpes_ and _sautes de foie gras_ are still left to
fill up the void in our hearts. Marquis, heed my counsel; cultivate
betimes the taste for the table,--that and whist are the sole resources
of declining years. You never met my old friend Talleyrand--ah, no! he
was long before your time. He cultivated both, but he made two mistakes.
No man's intellect is perfect on all sides. He confined himself to one
meal a day, and he never learned to play well at whist. Avoid his
errors, my young friend,--avoid them. Gandrin, I guess this pineapple is
English,--it is superb."

"You are right,--a present from the Marquis of H-------."

"Ah! instead of a fee, I wager. The Marquis gives nothing for nothing,
dear man! Droll people the English. You have never visited England, I
presume, _cher_ Rochebriant?" The affable financier had already made
vast progress in familiarity with his silent fellow-guest.

When the dinner was over and the three men had reentered the salon for
coffee and liqueurs, Gandrin left Louvier and Alain alone, saying he was
going to his cabinet for cigars which he could recommend. Then Louvier,
lightly patting the Marquis on the shoulder, said with what the French
call effusion, "My dear Rochebriant, your father and I did not quite
understand each other. He took a tone of grand seigneur that sometimes
wounded me; and I in turn was perhaps too rude in asserting my rights--as
creditor, shall I say?--no, as fellow-citizen; and Frenchmen are so vain,
so over-susceptible; fire up at a word; take offence when none is meant.
We two, my dear boy, should be superior to such national foibles. _Bref_
--I have a mortgage on your lands. Why should that thought mar our
friendship? At my age, though I am not yet old, one is flattered if the
young like us, pleased if we can oblige them, and remove from their
career any little obstacle in its way. Gandrin tells me you wish to
consolidate all the charges on your estate into one on a lower rate of
interest. Is it so?"

"I am so advised," said the Marquis.

"And very rightly advised; come and talk with me about it some day next
week. I hope to have a large sum of money set free in a few days. Of
course, mortgages on land don't pay like speculations at the Bourse; but
I am rich enough to please myself. We will see, we will see."

Here Gandrin returned with the cigars; but Alain at that time never
smoked, and Louvier excused himself, with a laugh and a sly wink, on the
plea that he was going to pay his respects--as doubtless that _joli
garcon_ was going to do likewise--to a belle dame who did not reckon the
smell of tobacco among the perfumes of Houbigant or Arabia.

"Meanwhile," added Louvier, turning to Gandrin, "I have something to say
to you on business about the contract for that new street of mine. No
hurry,--after our young friend has gone to his 'assignation.'"

Alain could not misinterpret the hint; and in a few moments took leave of
his host, more surprised than disappointed that the financier had not
invited him, as Graham had assumed he would, to his soiree the following
evening.

When Alain was gone, Louvier's jovial manner disappeared also, and became
bluffly rude rather than bluntly cordial. "Gandrin, what did you mean by
saying that that young man was no _muscadin_! _Muscadin, aristocrate_,
offensive from top to toe."

"You amaze me; you seemed to take to him so cordially."

"And pray, were you too blind to remark with what cold reserve he
responded to my condescensions; how he winced when I called him
Rochebriant; how he coloured when I called him 'dear boy'? These
aristocrats think we ought to thank them on our knees when they take our
money, and" here Louvier's face darkened--"seduce our women." "Monsieur
Louvier, in all France I do not know a greater aristocrat than yourself."

I don't know whether M. Gandrin meant that speech as a compliment, but M.
Louvier took it as such,--laughed complacently and rubbed his hands.
"Ay, ay, _millionnaires_ are the real aristocrats, for they have power,
as my _beau Marquis_ will soon find. I must bid you good night. Of
course I shall see Madame Gandrin and yourself to-morrow. Prepare for a
motley gathering,--lots of democrats and foreigners, with artists and
authors, and such creatures."

"Is that the reason why you did not invite the Marquis?"

"To be sure; I would not shock so pure a Legitimist by contact with the
sons of the people, and make him still colder to myself. No; when he
comes to my house he shall meet lions and _viveurs_ of the _haut ton_,
who will play into my hands by teaching him how to ruin himself in the
quickest manner and in the _genre Regence_. _Bon soir, mon vieux._"

CHAPTER VI.

The next night Graham in vain looked round for Alain in M. Louvier's
salons, and missed his high-bred mien and melancholy countenance.
M. Louvier had been for some four years a childless widower, but his
receptions were not the less numerously attended, nor his establishment
less magnificently monde for the absence of a presiding lady: very much
the contrary; it was noticeable how much he had increased his status and
prestige as a social personage since the death of his unlamented spouse.

To say truth, she had been rather a heavy drag on his triumphal car. She
had been the heiress of a man who had amassed a great deal of money,--not
in the higher walks of commerce, but in a retail trade.

Louvier himself was the son of a rich money-lender; he had entered life
with an ample fortune and an intense desire to be admitted into those
more brilliant circles in which fortune can be dissipated with _eclat_.
He might not have attained this object but for the friendly countenance
of a young noble who was then--

"The glass of fashion and the mould of form;"

but this young noble, of whom later we shall hear more, came suddenly to
grief, and when the money-lender's son lost that potent protector, the
dandies, previously so civil, showed him a very cold shoulder.

Louvier then became an ardent democrat, and recruited the fortune he had
impaired by the aforesaid marriage, launched into colossal speculations,
and became enormously rich. His aspirations for social rank now revived,
but his wife sadly interfered with them. She was thrifty by nature;
sympathized little with her husband's genius for accumulation; always
said he would end in a hospital; hated Republicans; despised authors and
artists, and by the ladies of the _beau monde_ was pronounced common and
vulgar.

So long as she lived, it was impossible for Louvier to realize his
ambition of having one of the salons which at Paris establish celebrity
and position. He could not then command those advantages of wealth which
he especially coveted. He was eminently successful in doing this now.
As soon as she was safe in Pere la Chaise, he enlarged his hotel by the
purchase and annexation of an adjoining house; redecorated and
refurnished it, and in this task displayed, it must be said to his
credit, or to that of the administrators he selected for the purpose, a
nobleness of taste rarely exhibited nowadays. His collection of pictures
was not large, and consisted exclusively of the French school, ancient
and modern, for in all things Louvier affected the patriot. But each of
those pictures was a gem; such Watteaus, such Greuzes, such landscapes by
Patel, and, above all, such masterpieces by Ingres, Horace Vernet, and
Delaroche were worth all the doubtful originals of Flemish and Italian
art which make the ordinary boast of private collectors.

These pictures occupied two rooms of moderate size, built for their
reception, and lighted from above. The great salon to which they led
contained treasures scarcely less precious; the walls were covered with
the richest silks which the looms of Lyons could produce. Every piece of
furniture here was a work of art in its way: console-tables of Florentine
mosaic, inlaid with pearl and lapis-lazuli; cabinets in which the
exquisite designs of the Renaissance were carved in ebony; colossal vases
of Russian malachite, but wrought by French artists. The very knick-
knacks scattered carelessly about the room might have been admired in the
cabinets of the Palazzo Pitti. Beyond this room lay the _salle de
danse_, its ceiling painted by ------, supported by white marble columns,
the glazed balcony and the angles of the room filled with tiers of
exotics. In the dining-room, on the same floor, on the other side of the
landing-place, were stored in glazed buffets not only vessels and salvers
of plate, silver and gold, but, more costly still, matchless specimens of
Sevres and Limoges, and mediaeval varieties of Venetian glass. On the
ground-floor, which opened on the lawn of a large garden, Louvier had his
suite of private apartments, furnished, as he said, "simply, according to
English notions of comfort;"--Englishmen would have said, "according to
French notions of luxury." Enough of these details, which a writer
cannot give without feeling himself somewhat vulgarized in doing so, but
without a loose general idea of which a reader would not have an accurate
conception of something not vulgar,--of something grave, historical,
possibly tragical,--the existence of a Parisian millionaire at the date
of this narrative.

The evidence of wealth was everywhere manifest at M. Louvier's, but it
was everywhere refined by an equal evidence of taste. The apartments
devoted to hospitality ministered to the delighted study of artists, to
whom free access was given, and of whom two or three might be seen daily
in the "show-rooms," copying pictures or taking sketches of rare articles
of furniture or effects for palatian interiors.

Among the things which rich English visitors of Paris most coveted to see
was M. Louvier's hotel, and few among the richest left it without a sigh
of envy and despair. Only in such London houses as belong to a
Sutherland or a Holford could our metropolis exhibit a splendour as
opulent and a taste as refined.

M. Louvier had his set evenings for popular assemblies. At these were
entertained the Liberals of every shade, from tricolor to rouge, with the
artists and writers most in vogue, pele-mele with decorated diplomatists,
ex-ministers, Orleanists, and Republicans, distinguished foreigners,
plutocrats of the Bourse, and lions male and female from the arid nurse
of that race, the Chaussee d'Antin. Of his more select reunions
something will be said later.

"And how does this poor Paris metamorphosed please Monsieur Vane?" asked
a Frenchman with a handsome, intelligent countenance, very carefully
dressed though in a somewhat bygone fashion, and carrying off his tenth
lustrum with an air too sprightly to evince any sense of the weight.
This gentleman, the Vicomte de Breze, was of good birth, and had a
legitimate right to his title of Vicomte,--which is more than can be said
of many vicomtes one meets at Paris. He had no other property, however,
than a principal share in an influential journal, to which he was a
lively and sparkling contributor. In his youth, under the reign of Louis
Philippe, he had been a chief among literary exquisites; and Balzac was
said to have taken him more than once as his model for those brilliant
young _vauriens_ who figure in the great novelist's comedy of Human Life.
The Vicomte's fashion expired with the Orleanist dynasty.

"Is it possible, my dear Vicomte," answered Graham, "not to be pleased
with a capital so marvellously embellished?"

"Embellished it may be to foreign eyes," said the Vicomte, sighing, "but
not improved to the taste of a Parisian like me. I miss the dear Paris
of old,--the streets associated with my _beaux jours_ are no more. Is
there not something drearily monotonous in those interminable
perspectives? How frightfully the way lengthens before one's eyes! In
the twists and curves of the old Paris one was relieved from the pain of
seeing how far one had to go from one spot to another,--each tortuous
street had a separate idiosyncrasy; what picturesque diversities, what
interesting recollections,--all swept away! _Mon Dieu_! and what for,--
miles of florid _facades_ staring and glaring at one with goggle-eyed
pitiless windows; house-rents trebled, and the consciousness that if you
venture to grumble underground railways, like concealed volcanoes, can
burst forth on you at any moment with an eruption of bayonets and
muskets. This _maudit_ empire seeks to keep its hold on France much as a
_grand seigneur_ seeks to enchain a nymph of the ballet,--tricks her out
in finery and baubles, and insures her infidelity the moment he fails to
satisfy her whims."

"Vicomte," answered Graham, "I have had the honour to know you since I
was a small boy at a preparatory school home for the holidays, and you
were a guest at my father's country-house. You were then _fete_ as one
of the most promising writers among the young men of the day, especially
favoured by the princes of the reigning family. I shall never forget the
impression made on me by your brilliant appearance and your no less
brilliant talk."

"Ah! _ces beaux jours! ce bon Louis Philippe, ce cher petit Joinville_,"
sighed the Vicomte.

"But at that day you compared _le bon_ Louis Philippe to Robert Macaire.
You described all his sons, including, no doubt, _ce cher petit
Joinville_, in terms of resentful contempt, as so many plausible _gamins_
whom Robert Macaire was training to cheat the public in the interest of
the family firm. I remember my father saying to you in answer, 'No royal
house in Europe has more sought to develop the literature of an epoch and
to signalize its representatives by social respect and official honours
than that of the Orleans dynasty. You, Monsieur de Breze, do but imitate
your elders in seeking to destroy the dynasty under which you flourish;
should you succeed, you _hommes de plume_ will be the first sufferers and
the loudest complainers.'"

"Cher Monsieur Vane," said the Vicomte, smiling complacently, "your
father did me great honour in classing me with Victor Hugo, Alexandre
Dumas, Emile de Girardin, and the other stars of the Orleanist galaxy,
including our friend here, M. Savarin. A very superior man was your
father."

"And," said Savarin, who, being an Orleanist, had listened to Graham's
speech with an approving smile,--"and if I remember right, my dear De
Breze, no one was more brilliantly severe than yourself on poor De
Lamartine and the Republic that succeeded Louis Philippe; no one more
emphatically expressed the yearning desire for another Napoleon to
restore order at home and renown abroad. Now you have got another
Napoleon."

"And I want change for my Napoleon," said De Breze, laughing.

"My dear Vicomte," said Graham, "one thing we may all grant,--that in
culture and intellect you are far superior to the mass of your fellow
Parisians; that you are therefore a favourable type of their political
character."

"_Ah, mon cher, vous etes trop aimable_."

"And therefore I venture to say this,--if the archangel Gabriel were
permitted to descend to Paris and form the best government for France
that the wisdom of seraph could devise, it would not be two years--I
doubt if it would be six months--before out of this Paris, which you call
the _Foyer des Idees_, would emerge a powerful party, adorned by yourself
and other _hommes de plume_, in favour of a revolution for the benefit of
_ce bon Satan_ and _ce cher petit Beelzebub_."

"What a pretty vein of satire you have, _mon cher_!" said the Vicomte,
good-humouredly; "there is a sting of truth in your witticism. Indeed,
I must send you some articles of mine in which I have said much the same
thing,--_les beaux, esprits se rencontrent_. The fault of us French is
impatience, desire of change; but then it is that desire which keeps the
world going and retains our place at the head of it. However, at this
time we are all living too fast for our money to keep up with it, and too
slow for our intellect not to flag. We vie with each other on the road
to ruin, for in literature all the old paths to fame are shut up."

Here a tall gentleman, with whom the Vicomte had been conversing before
he accosted Vane, and who had remained beside De Breze listening in
silent attention to this colloquy, interposed, speaking in the slow voice
of one accustomed to measure his words, and with a slight but
unmistakable German accent. "There is that, Monsieur de Breze, which
makes one think gravely of what you say so lightly. Viewing things with
the unprejudiced eyes of a foreigner, I recognize much for which France
should be grateful to the Emperor. Under his sway her material resources
have been marvellously augmented; her commerce has been placed by the
treaty with England on sounder foundations, and is daily exhibiting
richer life; her agriculture had made a prodigious advance wherever it
has allowed room for capitalists, and escaped from the curse of petty
allotments and peasant-proprietors, a curse which would have ruined any
country less blessed by Nature; turbulent factions have been quelled;
internal order maintained; the external prestige of France, up at least
to the date of the Mexican war, increased to an extent that might satisfy
even a Frenchman's amour propre; and her advance in civilization has been
manifested by the rapid creation of a naval power which should put even
England on her mettle. But, on the other hand--"

"Ay, on the other hand," said the Vicomte.

"On the other hand there are in the imperial system two causes of decay
and of rot silently at work. They may not be the faults of the Emperor,
but they are such misfortunes as may cause the fall of the Empire. The
first is an absolute divorce between the political system and the
intellectual culture of the nation. The throne and the system rest on
universal suffrage,--on a suffrage which gives to classes the most
ignorant a power that preponderates over all the healthful elements of
knowledge. It is the tendency of all ignorant multitudes to personify
themselves, as it were, in one individual. They cannot comprehend you
when you argue for a principle; they do comprehend you when you talk of
a name. The Emperor Napoleon is to them a name, and the prefects and
officials who influence their votes are paid for incorporating all
principles in the shibboleth of that single name. You have thus sought
the well-spring of a political system in the deepest stratum of popular
ignorance. To rid popular ignorance of its normal revolutionary bias,
the rural peasants are indoctrinated with the conservatism that comes
from the fear which appertains to property. They have their roots of
land or their shares in a national loan. Thus you estrange the
crassitude of an ignorant democracy still more from the intelligence of
the educated classes by combining it with the most selfish and abject of
all the apprehensions that are ascribed to aristocracy and wealth. What
is thus embedded in the depths of your society makes itself shown on the
surface. Napoleon III. has been compared to Augustus; and there are
many startling similitudes between them in character and in fate. Each
succeeds to the heritage of a great name that had contrived to unite
autocracy with the popular cause; each subdued all rival competitors,
and inaugurated despotic rule in the name of freedom; each mingled
enough of sternness with ambitious will to stain with bloodshed the
commencement of his power,--but it would be an absurd injustice to fix
the same degree of condemnation on the _coup d'etat_ as humanity fixes
on the earlier cruelties of Augustus; each, once firm in his seat,
became mild and clement,--Augustus perhaps from policy, Napoleon III.
from a native kindliness of disposition which no fair critic of
character can fail to acknowledge. Enough of similitudes; now for one
salient difference. Observe how earnestly Augustus strove, and how
completely he succeeded in the task, to rally round him all the leading
intellects in every grade and of every party,--the followers of Antony,
the friends of Brutus; every great captain, every great statesman, every
great writer, every mail who could lend a ray of mind to his own Julian
constellation, and make the age of Augustus an era in the annals of
human intellect and genius. But this has not been the good fortune of
your Emperor. The result of his system has been the, suppression of
intellect in every department. He has rallied round him not one great
statesman; his praises are hymned by not one great poet. The celebrates
of a former day stand aloof; or, preferring exile to constrained
allegiance, assail him with unremitting missiles from their asylum in
foreign shores. His reign is sterile of new celebrites. The few that
arise enlist themselves against him. Whenever he shall venture to give
full freedom to the press and to the legislature, the intellect thus
suppressed or thus hostile will burst forth in collected volume. His
partisans have not been trained and disciplined to meet such assailants.
They will be as weak as no doubt they will be violent. And the worst
is, that the intellect thus rising in mass against him will be warped
and distorted, like captives who, being kept in chains, exercise their
limbs on escaping in vehement jumps without definite object. The
directors of emancipated opinion may thus be terrible enemies to the
Imperial Government, but they will be very unsafe councillors to France.
Concurrently with this divorce between the Imperial system and the
national intellect,--a divorce so complete that even your salons have
lost their wit, and even your caricatures their point,--a corruption of
manners which the Empire, I own, did not originate, but inherit, has
become so common that every one owns and nobody blames it. The gorgeous
ostentation of the Court has perverted the habits of the people. The
intelligence abstracted from other vents betakes itself to speculating
for a fortune; and the greed of gain and the passion for show are
sapping the noblest elements of the old French manhood. Public opinion
stamps with no opprobrium a minister or favourite who profits by a job;
and I fear you will find that jobbing pervades all your administrative
departments."

"All very true," said De Breze, with a shrug of the shoulders and in a
tone of levity that seemed to ridicule the assertion he volunteered;
"Virtue and Honour banished from courts and salons and the cabinet of
authors ascend to fairer heights in the attics of _ouvriers_."

"The _ouvriers_, _ouvriers_ of Paris!" cried this terrible German.

"Ay, Monsieur le Comte, what can you say against our _ouvriers_? A
German count cannot condescend to learn anything about _ces petites
gens_."

"Monsieur," replied the German, "in the eyes of a statesman there are no
_petites gens_, and in those of a philosopher no _petites choses_. We in
Germany have too many difficult problems affecting our working classes to
solve, not to have induced me to glean all the information I can as to
the _ouvriers_ of Paris. They have among them men of aspirations as
noble as can animate the souls of philosophers and poets, perhaps not the
less noble because common-sense and experience cannot follow their
flight; but as a body the _ouvriers_ of Paris have not been elevated in
political morality by the benevolent aim of the Emperor to find them
ample work and good wages independent of the natural laws that regulate
the markets of labour. Accustomed thus to consider the State bound to
maintain them, the moment the State fails in that impossible task, they
will accommodate their honesty to a rush upon property under the name of
social reform.

"Have you not noticed how largely increased within the last few years is
the number of those who cry out, 'La Propriete, cest le vol'? Have you
considered the rapid growth of the International Association? I do not
say that for all these evils--the Empire is exclusively responsible. To
a certain degree they are found in all rich communities, especially where
democracy is more or less in the ascendant. To a certain extent they
exist in the large towns of Germany; they are conspicuously increasing in
England; they are acknowledged to be dangerous in the United States of
America; they are, I am told on good authority, making themselves visible
with the spread of civilization in Russia. But under the French Empire
they have become glaringly rampant, and I venture to predict that the day
is not far off when the rot at work throughout all layers and strata of
French society will insure a fall of the fabric at the sound of which the
world will ring.

"There is many a fair and stately tree which continues to throw out its
leaves and rear its crest till suddenly the wind smites it, and then, and
not till then, the trunk which seems so solid is found to be but the rind
to a mass of crumbled powder."

"Monsieur le Comte," said the Vicomte, "you are a severe critic and a
lugubrious prophet; but a German is so safe from revolution that he takes
alarm at the stir of movement which is the normal state of the French
esprit."

"French esprit may soon evaporate into Parisian _betise_. As to Germany
being safe from revolution, allow me to repeat a saying of Goethe's_-but
has Monsieur le Vicomte ever heard of Goethe?"

"Goethe, of course,--_tres joli ecrivain_."

"Goethe said to some one who was making much the same remark as yourself,
'We Germans are in a state of revolution now, but we do things so slowly
that it will be a hundred years before we Germans shall find it out; but
when completed, it will be the greatest revolution society has yet seen,
and will last like the other revolutions that, beginning, scarce noticed,
in Germany, have transformed the world.'"

"Diable, Monsieur le Comte! Germans transformed the world! What
revolutions do you speak of?"

"The invention of gunpowder, the invention of printing, and the expansion
of a monk's quarrel with his Pope into the Lutheran revolution."

Here the German paused, and asked the Vicomte to introduce him to Vane,
which De Breze did by the title of Count von Rudesheim. On hearing
Vane's name, the Count inquired if he were related to the orator and
statesman, George Graham Vane, whose opinions, uttered in Parliament,
were still authoritative among German thinkers. This compliment to his
deceased father immensely gratified but at the same time considerably
surprised the Englishman. His father, no doubt, had been a man of much
influence in the British House of Commons,--a very weighty speaker, and,
while in office, a first-rate administrator; but Englishmen know what a
House of Commons reputation is,--how fugitive, how little cosmopolitan;
and that a German count should ever have heard of his father delighted
but amazed him. In stating himself to be the son of George Graham Vane,
he intimated not only the delight but the amaze, with the frank _savoir
vivre_ which was one of his salient characteristics.

"Sir," replied the German, speaking in very correct English, but still
with his national accent, "every German reared to political service
studies England as the school for practical thought distinct from
impracticable theories. Long may you allow us to do so! Only excuse me
one remark,--never let the selfish element of the practical supersede the
generous element. Your father never did so in his speeches, and
therefore we admired him. At the present day we don't so much care to
study English speeches; they may be insular,--they are not European. I
honour England; Heaven grant that you may not be making sad mistakes in
the belief that you can long remain England if you cease to be European."
Herewith the German bowed, not uncivilly,--on the contrary, somewhat
ceremoniously,--and disappeared with a Prussian Secretary of Embassy,
whose arm he linked in his own, into a room less frequented.

"Vicomte, who and what is your German count?" asked Vane.

"A solemn pedant," answered the lively Vicomte,--"a German count, _que
voulez-vous de plus?"

CHAPTER VII.

A LITTLE later Graham found himself alone amongst the crowd. Attracted
by the sound of music, he had strayed into one of the rooms whence it
came, and in which, though his range of acquaintance at Paris was for an
Englishman large and somewhat miscellaneous, he recognized no familiar
countenance. A lady was playing the pianoforte--playing remarkably well
--with accurate science, with that equal lightness and strength of finger
which produces brilliancy of execution; but to appreciate her music one
should be musical one's self. It wanted the charm that fascinates the
uninitiated. The guests in the room were musical connoisseurs,--a class
with whom Graham Vane had nothing in common. Even if he had been more
capable of enjoying the excellence of the player's performance, the
glance he directed towards her would have sufficed to chill him into
indifference. She was not young, and with prominent features and
puckered skin, was twisting her face into strange sentimental grimaces,
as if terribly overcome by the beauty and pathos of her own melodies.
To add to Vane's displeasure, she was dressed in a costume wholly
antagonistic to his views of the becoming,--in a Greek jacket of gold and
scarlet, contrasted by a Turkish turban.

Muttering "What she-mountebank have we here?" he sank into a chair behind
the door, and fell into an absorbed revery. From this he was aroused by
the cessation of the music and the hum of subdued approbation by which it
was followed. Above the hum swelled the imposing voice of M. Louvier as
he rose from a seat on the other side of the piano, by which his bulky
form had been partially concealed.

"Bravo! perfectly played! excellent! Can we not persuade your charming
young countrywoman to gratify us even by a single song?" Then turning
aside and addressing some one else invisible to Graham he said, "Does
that tyrannical doctor still compel you to silence, Mademoiselle?"

A voice so sweetly modulated that if there were any sarcasm in the words
it was lost in the softness of pathos, answered, "Nay, Monsieur Louvier,
he rather overtasks the words at my command in thankfulness to those who
like yourself, so kindly regard me as something else than a singer."

It was not the she-mountebank who thus spoke. Graham rose and looked
round with instinctive curiosity. He met the face that he said had
haunted him. She too had risen, standing near the piano, with one hand
tenderly resting on the she-mountebank's scarlet and gilded shoulder,--
the face that haunted him, and yet with a difference. There was a faint
blush on the clear pale cheek, a soft yet playful light in the grave
dark-blue eyes, which had not been visible in the countenance of the
young lady in the pearl-coloured robe. Graham did not hear Louvier's
reply, though no doubt it was loud enough for him to hear. He sank again
into revery. Other guests now came into the room, among them Frank
Morley, styled Colonel,--eminent military titles in the United States do
not always denote eminent military services,--a wealthy American, and his
sprightly and beautiful wife. The Colonel was a clever man, rather stiff
in his deportment, and grave in speech, but by no means without a vein of
dry humour. By the French he was esteemed a high-bred specimen of the
kind of grand seigneur which democratic republics engender. He spoke
French like a Parisian, had an imposing presence, and spent a great deal
of money with the elegance of a man of taste and the generosity of a man
of heart. His high breeding was not quite so well understood by the
English, because the English are apt to judge breeding by little
conventional rules not observed by the American Colonel. He had a slight
nasal twang, and introduced "sir" with redundant ceremony in addressing
Englishmen, however intimate he might be with them, and had the habit
(perhaps with a sly intention to startle or puzzle them) of adorning his
style of conversation with quaint Americanisms.

Nevertheless, the genial amiability and the inherent dignity of his
character made him acknowledged as a thorough gentleman by every
Englishman, however conventional in tastes, who became admitted into his
intimate acquaintance.

Mrs. Morley, ten or twelve years younger than her husband, had no nasal
twang, and employed no Americanisms in her talk, which was frank, lively,
and at times eloquent. She had a great ambition to be esteemed of a
masculine understanding; Nature unkindly frustrated that ambition in
rendering her a model of feminine grace. Graham was intimately
acquainted with Colonel Morley; and with Mrs. Morley had contracted one
of those cordial friendships, which, perfectly free alike from polite
flirtation and Platonic attachment, do sometimes spring up between
persons of opposite sexes without the slightest danger of changing their
honest character into morbid sentimentality or unlawful passion. The
Morleys stopped to accost Graham, but the lady had scarcely said three
words to him, before, catching sight of the haunting face, she darted
towards it. Her husband, less emotional, bowed at the distance, and
said, "To my taste, sir, the Signorina Cicogna is the loveliest girl in
the present bee,* and full of mind, sir."

[*Bee, a common expression in "the West" for a meeting or gathering
]of people.

"Singing mind," said Graham, sarcastically, and in the ill-natured
impulse of a man striving to check his inclination to admire.

"I have not heard her sing," replied the American, dryly; "and the words
'singing mind' are doubtless accurately English, since you employ them;
but at Boston the collocation would be deemed barbarous. You fly off the
handle. The epithet, sir, is not in concord with the substantive."

"Boston would be in the right, my dear Colonel. I stand rebuked; mind
has little to do with singing."

"I take leave to deny that, sir. You fire into the wrong flock, and
would not hazard the remark if you had conversed as I have with Signorina
Cicogna"

Before Graham could answer, Signorina Cicogna stood before him, leaning
lightly on Mrs. Morley's arm.

"Frank, you must take us into the refreshment-room," said Mrs. Morley to
her husband; and then, turning to Graham, added, "Will you help to make
way for us?"

Graham bowed, and offered his arm to the fair speaker. "No," said she,
taking her husband's. "Of course you know the Signorina, or, as we
usually call her, Mademoiselle Cicogna. No? Allow me to present you.
Mr. Graham Vane, Mademoiselle Cicogna. Mademoiselle speaks English like
a native."

And thus abruptly Graham was introduced to the owner of the haunting
face. He had lived too much in the great world all his life to retain
the innate shyness of an Englishman; but he certainly was confused and
embarrassed when his eyes met Isaura's, and he felt her hand on his arm.
Before quitting the room she paused and looked back. Graham's look
followed her own, and saw behind them the lady with the scarlet jacket
escorted by some portly and decorated connoisseur. Isaura's face
brightened to another kind of brightness,--a pleased and tender light.

"Poor dear Madre," she murmured to herself in Italian. "Madre!" echoed
Graham, also in Italian. "I have been misinformed, then; that lady is
your mother."

Isaura laughed a pretty, low, silvery laugh, and replied in English, "She
is not my mother; but I call her Madre, for I know no name more loving."

Graham was touched, and said gently, "Your own mother was evidently very
dear to you."

Isaura's lip quivered, and she made a slight movement as if she would
have withdrawn her hand from his arm. He saw that he had offended or
wounded her, and with the straightforward frankness natural to him,
resumed quickly, "My remark was impertinent in a stranger; forgive it."

"There is nothing to forgive, Monsieur."

The two now threaded their way through the crowd, both silent. At last
Isaura, thinking she ought to speak first in order to show that Graham
had not offended her, said,

"How lovely Mrs. Morley is!"

"Yes; and I like the spirit and ease of her American manner. Have you
known her long, Mademoiselle?"

"No; we met her for the first time some weeks ago at M. Savarin's."

"Was she very eloquent on the rights of women?"

"What! you have heard her on that subject?"

"I have rarely heard her on any other, though she is the best and perhaps
the cleverest friend I have at Paris; but that may be my fault, for I
like to start it. It is a relief to the languid small-talk of society to
listen to any one thoroughly in earnest upon turning the world topsy-
turvy."

"Do you suppose poor Mrs. Morley would seek to do that if she had her
rights?" asked Isaura, with her musical laugh.

"Not a doubt of it; but perhaps you share her opinions."

"I scarcely know what her opinions are, but--"

"Yes?--but--"

"There is a--what shall I call it?--a persuasion, a sentiment, out of
which the opinions probably spring, that I do share."

"Indeed? a persuasion, a sentiment, for instance, that a woman should
have votes in the choice of legislators, and, I presume, in the task of
legislation?"

"No, that is not what I mean. Still, that is an opinion, right or wrong,
which grows out of the sentiment I speak of."

"Pray explain the sentiment."

"It is always so difficult to define a sentiment; but does it not strike
you that in proportion as the tendency of modern civilization has been to
raise women more and more to an intellectual equality with men, in
proportion as they read and study and think, an uneasy sentiment, perhaps
querulous, perhaps unreasonable, grows up within their minds that the
conventions of the world are against the complete development of the
faculties thus aroused and the ambition thus animated; that they cannot
but rebel, though it may be silently, against the notions of the former
age, when women were not thus educated, notions that the aim of the sex
should be to steal through life unremarked; that it is a reproach to be
talked of; that women are plants to be kept in a hothouse and forbidden
the frank liberty of growth in the natural air and sunshine of heaven?
This, at least, is a sentiment which has sprung up within myself; and I
imagine that it is the sentiment which has given birth to many of the
opinions or doctrines that seem absurd, and very likely are so, to the
general public. I don't pretend even to have considered those doctrines;
I don't pretend to say what may be the remedies for the restlessness and
uneasiness I feel. I doubt if on this earth there be any remedies; all I
know is, that I feel restless and uneasy."

Graham gazed on her countenance as she spoke with an astonishment not
unmingled with tenderness and compassion, astonishment at the contrast
between a vein of reflection so hardy, expressed in a style of language
that seemed to him so masculine, and the soft velvet dreamy eyes, the
gentle tones, and delicate purity of hues rendered younger still by the
blush that deepened their bloom.

At this moment they had entered the refreshment-room; but a dense group
being round the table, and both perhaps forgetting the object for which
Mrs. Morley had introduced them to each other, they had mechancially
seated themselves on an ottoman in a recess while Isaura was yet
speaking. It must seem as strange to the reader as it did to Graham that
such a speech should have been spoken by so young a girl to an
acquaintance so new; but in truth Isaura was very little conscious of
Graham's presence. She had got on a subject that perplexed and tormented
her solitary thoughts; she was but thinking aloud.

"I believe," said Graham, after a pause, "that I comprehend your
sentiment much better than I do Mrs. Morley's opinions; but permit me one
observation. You say truly that the course of modern civilization has
more or less affected the relative position of woman cultivated beyond
that level on which she was formerly contented to stand,--the nearer
perhaps to the heart of man because not lifting her head to his height,
--and hence a sense of restlessness, uneasiness; but do you suppose that,
in this whirl and dance of the atoms which compose the rolling ball of
the civilized world, it is only women that are made restless and uneasy?
Do you not see amid the masses congregated in the wealthiest cities of
the world, writhings and struggles against the received order of things?
In this sentiment of discontent there is a certain truthfulness, because
it is an element of human nature, and how best to deal with it is a
problem yet unsolved; but in the opinions and doctrines to which, among
the masses, the sentiment gives birth, the wisdom of the wisest detects
only the certainty of a common ruin, offering for reconstruction the same
building-materials as the former edifice,--materials not likely to be
improved because they may be defaced. Ascend from the working classes to
all others in which civilized culture prevails, and you will find that
same restless feeling,--the fluttering of untried wings against the bars
between wider space and their longings. Could you poll all the educated
ambitious young men in England,--perhaps in Europe,--at least half of
them, divided between a reverence for the past and a curiosity as to the
future, would sigh, 'I am born a century too late or a century too
soon!'"

Isaura listened to this answer with a profound and absorbing interest.
It was the first time that a clever young man talked thus sympathetically
to her, a clever young girl.

Then, rising, he said, "I see your Madre and our American friends are
darting angry looks at me. They have made room for us at the table, and
are wondering why I should keep you thus from the good things of this
little life. One word more ere we join them,--consult your own mind,
and consider whether your uneasiness and unrest are caused solely by
conventional shackles on your sex. Are they not equally common to the
youth of ours,--common to all who seek in art, in letters, nay, in the
stormier field of active life, to clasp as a reality some image yet seen
but as a dream?"

CHAPTER VIII.

No further conversation in the way of sustained dialogue took place that
evening between Graham and Isaura.

The Americans and the Savarins clustered round Isaura when they quitted
the refreshment-room. The party was breaking up. Vane would have
offered his arm again to Isaura, but M. Savarin had forestalled him. The
American was despatched by his wife to see for the carriage; and Mrs.
Morley said, with her wonted sprightly tone of command,

"Now, Mr. Vane, you have no option but to take care of me to the shawl-
room."

Madame Savarin and Signora Venosta had each found their cavaliers, the
Italian still retaining hold of the portly connoisseur, and the
Frenchwoman accepting the safeguard of the Vicomte de Breze. As they
descended the stairs, Mrs. Morley asked Graham what he thought of the
young lady to whom she had presented him.

"I think she is charming," answered Graham.

"Of course; that is the stereotyped answer to all such questions,
especially by you Englishmen. In public or in private, England is the
mouthpiece of platitudes."

"It is natural for an American to think so. Every child that has just
learned to speak uses bolder expressions than its grandmamma; but I am
rather at a loss to know by what novelty of phrase an American would have
answered your question."

"An American would have discovered that Isaura Cicogna had a soul, and
his answer would have confessed it."

"It strikes me that he would then have uttered a platitude more stolid
than mine. Every Christian knows that the dullest human being has a
soul. But, to speak frankly, I grant that my answer did not do justice
to the Signorina, nor to the impression she makes on me; and putting
aside the charm of the face, there is a charm in a mind that seems to
have gathered stores of reflection which I should scarcely have expected
to find in a young lady brought up to be a professional singer."

"You add prejudice to platitude, and are horribly prosaic to-night; but
here we are in the shawl-room. I must take another opportunity of
attacking you. Pray dine with us tomorrow; you will meet our Minister
and a few other pleasant friends."

"I suppose I must not say, 'I shall be charmed,'" answered Vane; "but I
shall be."

"Bon Dieu! that horrid fat man has deserted Signora Venosta,--looking
for his own cloak, I dare say; selfish monster! Go and hand her to her
carriage; quick, it is announced!"

Graham, thus ordered, hastened to offer his arm to the she-mountebank.
Somehow she had acquired dignity in his eyes, and he did not feel the
least ashamed of being in contact with the scarlet jacket.

The Signora grappled to him with a confiding familiarity. "I am afraid,"
she said in Italian, as they passed along the spacious hall to the porte
cochere,--"I am afraid that I did not make a good effect to-night. I was
nervous; did not you perceive it?"

"No, indeed; you enchanted us all;" replied the dissimulator.

"How amiable you are to say so! You must think that I sought for a
compliment. So I did; you gave me more than I deserved. Wine is the
milk of old men, and praise of old women; but an old man may be killed by
too much wine, and an old woman lives all the longer for too much praise.
Buona notte."

Here she sprang, lithesomely enough, into the carriage, and Isaura
followed, escorted by M. Savarin. As the two men returned towards the
shawl-room, the Frenchman said, "Madame Savarin and I complain that you
have not let us see so much of you as we ought. No doubt you are greatly
sought after; but are you free to take your soup with us the day after
to-morrow? You will meet the Count von Rudesheim, and a few others more
lively if less wise."

"The day after to-morrow I will mark with a white stone. To dine with M.
Savarin is an event to a man who covets distinction."

"Such compliments reconcile an author to his trade. You deserve the best
return I can make you. You will meet la belle Isaura. I have just
engaged her and her chaperon. She is a girl of true genius; and genius
is like those objects of virtu which belong to a former age, and become
every day more scarce and more precious."

Here they encountered Colonel Morley and his wife hurrying to their
carriage. The American stopped Vane, and whispered, "I am glad, sir,
to hear from my wife that you dine with us to-morrow. Sir, you will meet
Mademoiselle Cicogna, and I am not without a kinkle [notion] that you
will be enthused."

"This seems like a fatality," soliloquized Vane as he walked through the
deserted streets towards his lodging. "I strove to banish that haunting
face from my mind. I had half forgotten it, and now--" Here his murmur
sank into silence. He was deliberating in very conflicted thought
whether or not he should write to refuse the two invitations he had
accepted.

"Pooh!" he said at last, as he reached the door of his lodging, "is my
reason so weak that it should be influenced by a mere superstition?
Surely I know myself too well, and have tried myself too long, to fear
that I should be untrue to the duty and ends of my life, even if I found
my heart in danger of suffering."

Certainly the Fates do seem to mock our resolves to keep our feet from
their ambush, and our hearts from their snare! How our lives may be
coloured by that which seems to us the most trivial accident, the merest
chance! Suppose that Alain de Rochebriant had been invited to that
reunion at M. Louvier's, and Graham Vane had accepted some other
invitation and passed his evening elsewhere, Alain would probably have
been presented to Isaura--what then might have happened? The impression
Isaura had already made upon the young Frenchman was not so deep as that
made upon Graham; but then, Alain's resolution to efface it was but
commenced that day, and by no means yet confirmed. And if he had been
the first clever young man to talk earnestly to that clever young girl,
who can guess what impression he might have made upon her? His
conversation might have had less philosophy and strong sense than
Graham's, but more of poetic sentiment and fascinating romance.

However, the history of events that do not come to pass is not in the
chronicle of the Fates.

BOOK III.

CHAPTER I.

The next day the guests at the Morleys' had assembled when Vane entered.
His apology for unpunctuality was cut short by the lively hostess. "Your
pardon is granted without the humiliation of asking for it; we know that
the characteristic of the English is always to be a little behindhand."

She then proceeded to introduce him to the American Minister, to a
distinguished American poet, with a countenance striking for mingled
sweetness and power, and one or two other of her countrymen sojourning at
Paris; and this ceremony over, dinner was announced, and she bade Graham
offer his arm to Mademoiselle Cicogna.

"Have you ever visited the United States, Mademoiselle?" asked Vane, as
they seated themselves at the table.

"No."

"It is a voyage you are sure to make soon."

"Why so?"

"Because report says you will create a great sensation at the very
commencement of your career; and the New World is ever eager to welcome
each celebrity that is achieved in the Old,--more especially that which
belongs to your enchanting art."

"True, sir," said an American senator, solemnly striking into the
conversation; "we are an appreciative people; and if that lady be as fine
a singer as I am told, she might command any amount of dollars."

Isaura coloured, and turning to Graham, asked him in a low voice if he
were fond of music.

"I ought of course to say 'yes,' answered Graham, in the same tone; "but
I doubt if that 'yes' would be an honest one. In some moods, music--if a
kind of music I like--affects me very deeply; in other moods, not at all.
And I cannot bear much at a time. A concert wearies me shamefully; even
an opera always seems to me a great deal too long. But I ought to add
that I am no judge of music; that music was never admitted into my
education; and, between ourselves, I doubt if there be one Englishman in
five hundred who would care for opera or concert if it were not the
fashion to say he did. Does my frankness revolt you?"

"On the contrary, I sometimes doubt, especially of late, if I am fond of
music myself."

"Signorina,--pardon me,--it is impossible that you should not be. Genius
can never be untrue to itself, and must love that in which it excels,
that by which it communicates joy, and," he added, with a half-suppressed
sigh, "attains to glory."

"Genius is a divine word, and not to be applied to a singer," said
Isaura, with a humility in which there was an earnest sadness.

Graham was touched and startled; but before he could answer, the American
Minister appealed to him across the table, asking if he had quoted
accurately a passage in a speech by Graham's distinguished father, in
regard to the share which England ought to take in the political affairs
of Europe.

The conversation now became general, very political and very serious.
Graham was drawn into it, and grew animated and eloquent.

Isaura listened to him with admiration. She was struck by what seemed to
her a nobleness of sentiment which elevated his theme above the level of
commonplace polemics. She was pleased to notice, in the attentive
silence of his intelligent listeners, that they shared the effect
produced on herself. In fact, Graham Vane was a born orator, and his
studies had been those of a political thinker. In common talk he was but
the accomplished man of the world, easy and frank and genial, with a
touch of good-natured sarcasm; but when the subject started drew him
upward to those heights in which politics become the science of humanity,
he seemed a changed being. His cheek glowed, his eye brightened, his
voice mellowed into richer tones, his language be came unconsciously
adorned. In such moments there might scarcely be an audience, even
differing from him in opinion, which would not have acknowledged his
spell.

When the party adjourned to the salon, Isaura said softly to Graham, "I
understand why you did not cultivate music; and I think, too, that I can
now understand what effects the human voice can produce on human minds
without recurring to the art of song."

"Ah," said Graham, with a pleased smile, "do not make me ashamed of my
former rudeness by the revenge of compliment; and, above all, do not
disparage your own art by supposing that any prose effect of voice in its
utterance of mind can interpret that which music alone can express, even
to listeners so uncultured as myself. Am I not told truly by musical
composers, when I ask them to explain in words what they say in their
music, that such explanation is impossible, that music has a language of
its own untranslatable by words?"

"Yes," said Isaura, with thoughtful brow but brightening eyes, "you are
told truly. It was only the other day that I was pondering over that
truth."

"But what recesses of mind, of heart, of soul, this untranslatable
language penetrates and brightens up! How incomplete the grand nature of
man--though man the grandest--would be, if you struck out of his reason
the comprehension of poetry, music, and religion! In each are reached
and are sounded deeps in his reason otherwise concealed from himself.
History, knowledge, science, stop at the point in which mystery begins.
There they meet with the world of shadow. Not an inch of that world can
they penetrate without the aid of poetry and religion, two necessities of
intellectual man much more nearly allied than the votaries of the
practical and the positive suppose. To the aid and elevation of both
those necessities comes in music, and there has never existed a religion
in the world which has not demanded music as its ally. If, as I said
frankly, it is only in certain moods of my mind that I enjoy music, it is
only because in certain moods of my mind I am capable of quitting the
guidance of prosaic reason for the world of shadow; that I am so
susceptible as at every hour, were my nature perfect, I should be to the
mysterious influences of poetry and religion. Do you understand what I
wish to express?"

"Yes, I do, and clearly."

"Then, Signorina, you are forbidden to undervalue the gift of song. You
must feel its power over the heart, when you enter the opera-house; over
the soul, when you kneel in a cathedral."

"Oh," cried Isaura, with enthusiasm, a rich glow mantling over her lovely
face, "how I thank you! Is it you who say you do not love music? How
much better you understand it than I did till this moment!"

Here Mrs. Morley, joined by the American poet, came to the corner in
which the Englishman and the singer had niched themselves. The poet
began to talk, the other guests gathered round, and every one listened
reverentially till the party broke up. Colonel Morley handed Isaura to
her carriage; the she-mountebank again fell to the lot of Graham.

"Signor," said she, as he respectfully placed her shawl round her
scarlet-and-gilt jacket, "are we so far from Paris that you cannot spare
the time to call? My child does not sing in public, but at home you can
hear her. It is not every woman's voice that is sweetest at home."

Graham bowed, and said he would call on the morrow. Isaura mused in
silent delight over the words which had so extolled the art of the
singer. Alas, poor child! she could not guess that in those words,
reconciling her to the profession of the stage, the speaker was pleading
against his own heart.

There was in Graham's nature, as I think it commonly is in that of most
true orators, a wonderful degree of intellectual conscience which
impelled him to acknowledge the benignant influences of song, and to set
before the young singer the noblest incentives to the profession to which
he deemed her assuredly destined; but in so doing he must have felt that
he was widening the gulf between her life and his own. Perhaps he wished
to widen it in proportion as he dreaded to listen to any voice in his
heart which asked if the gulf might not be overleapt.

CHAPTER II.

ON the morrow Graham called at the villa at A------. The two ladies
received him in Isaura's chosen sitting-room.

Somehow or other, conversation at first languished. Graham was reserved
and distant, Isaura shy and embarrassed. The Venosta had the frais of
making talk to herself. Probably at another time Graham would have been
amused and interested in the observation of a character new to him, and
thoroughly southern,--lovable not more from its naive simplicity of
kindliness than from various little foibles and vanities, all of which
were harmless, and some of them endearing as those of a child whom it is
easy to make happy, and whom it seems so cruel to pain; and with all the
Venosta's deviations from the polished and tranquil good taste of the
beau monde, she had that indescribable grace which rarely deserts a
Florentine, so that you might call her odd but not vulgar; while, though
uneducated, except in the way of her old profession, and never having
troubled herself to read anything but a libretto and the pious books
commended to her by her confessor, the artless babble of her talk every
now and then flashed out with a quaint humour, lighting up terse
fragments of the old Italian wisdom which had mysteriously embedded
themselves in the groundwork of her mind.

But Graham was not at this time disposed to judge the poor Venosta kindly
or fairly. Isaura had taken high rank in his thoughts. He felt an
impatient resentment mingled with anxiety and compassionate tenderness at
a companionship which seemed to him derogatory to the position he would
have assigned to a creature so gifted, and unsafe as a guide amidst the
perils and trials to which the youth, the beauty, and the destined
profession of Isaura were exposed. Like most Englishmen--especially
Englishmen wise in the knowledge of life--he held in fastidious regard
the proprieties and conventions by which the dignity of woman is fenced
round; and of those proprieties and conventions the Venosta naturally
appeared to him a very unsatisfactory guardian and representative.

Happily unconscious of these hostile prepossessions, the elder Signora
chatted on very gayly to the visitor. She was in excellent spirits;
people had been very civil to her both at Colonel Morley's and M.
Louvier's. The American Minister had praised the scarlet jacket. She
was convinced she had made a sensation two nights running. When the
_amour propre_ is pleased, the tongue is freed.

The Venosta ran on in praise of Paris and the Parisians; of Louvier and
his soiree and the pistachio ice; of the Americans, and a certain _creme
de maraschino_ which she hoped the Signor Inglese had not failed to
taste,--the _creme de maraschino_ led her thoughts back to Italy. Then
she grew mournful. How she missed the native _beau ciel_! Paris was
pleasant, but how absurd to call it "le Paradis des Femmes,"--as if les
Femmes could find Paradise in a _brouillard_!

"But," she exclaimed, with vivacity of voice and gesticulation, "the
Signor does not come to hear the parrot talk; he is engaged to come that
he may hear the nightingale sing. A drop of honey attracts the fly more
than a bottle of vinegar."

Graham could not help smiling at this adage. "I submit," said he, "to
your comparison as regards myself; but certainly anything less like a
bottle of vinegar than your amiable conversation I cannot well conceive.
However, the metaphor apart, I scarcely know how I dare ask Mademoiselle
to sing after the confession I made to her last night."

"What confession?" asked the Venosta.

"That I know nothing of music and doubt if I can honestly say that I am
fond of it."

"Not fond of music! Impossible! You slander yourself. He who loves not
music would have a dull time of it in heaven. But you are English, and
perhaps have only heard the music of your own country. Bad, very bad--a
heretic's music! Now listen."

Seating herself at the piano, she began an air from the "Lucia," crying
out to Isaura to come and sing to her accompaniment.

"Do you really wish it?" asked Isaura of Graham, fixing on him
questioning, timid eyes.

"I cannot say how much I wish to hear you."

Isaura moved to the instrument, and Graham stood behind her. Perhaps he
felt that he should judge more impartially of her voice if not subjected
to the charm of her face.

But the first note of the voice held him spell-bound. In itself the
organ was of the rarest order, mellow and rich, but so soft that its
power was lost in its sweetness, and so exquisitely fresh in every note.

But the singer's charm was less in voice than in feeling; she conveyed to
the listener so much more than was said by the words, or even implied by
the music. Her song in this caught the art of the painter who impresses
the mind with the consciousness of a something which the eye cannot
detect on the canvas.

She seemed to breathe out from the depths of her heart the intense pathos
of the original romance, so far exceeding that of the opera,-the human
tenderness, the mystic terror of a tragic love-tale more solemn in its
sweetness than that of Verona.

When her voice died away no applause came,--not even a murmur. Isaura
bashfully turned round to steal a glance at her silent listener, and
beheld moistened eyes and quivering lips. At that moment she was
reconciled to her art. Graham rose abruptly and walked to the window.

"Do you doubt now if you are fond of music?" cried the Venosta.

"This is more than music," answered Graham, still with averted face.
Then, after a short pause, he approached Isaura, and said, with a
melancholy half-smile,--

"I do not think, Mademoiselle, that I could dare to hear you often; it
would take me too far from the hard real world: and he who would not be
left behindhand on the road that he must journey cannot indulge frequent
excursions into fairyland."

"Yet," said Isaura, in a tone yet sadder, "I was told in my childhood, by
one whose genius gives authority to her words, that beside the real world
lies the ideal. The real world then seemed rough to me. 'Escape,' said
my counsellor, 'is granted from that stony thoroughfare into the fields
beyond its formal hedgerows. The ideal world has its sorrows, but it
never admits despair.' That counsel then, methought, decided my choice
of life. I know not now if it has done so."

"Fate," answered Graham, slowly and thoughtfully, "Fate, which is not
the ruler but the servant of Providence, decides our choice of life, and
rarely from outward circumstances. Usually the motive power is within.
We apply the word 'genius' to the minds of the gifted few; but in all of
us there is a genius that is inborn, a pervading something which
distinguishes our very identity, and dictates to the conscience that
which we are best fitted to do and to be. In so dictating it compels
our choice of life; or if we resist the dictate, we find at the close
that we have gone astray. My choice of life thus compelled is on the
stony thoroughfares, yours in the green fields."

As he thus said, his face became clouded and mournful. The Venosta,
quickly tired of a conversation in which she had no part, and having
various little household matters to attend to, had during this dialogue
slipped unobserved from the room; yet neither Isaura nor Graham felt the
sudden consciousness that they were alone which belongs to lovers.
"Why," asked Isaura, with that magic smile reflected in countless dimples
which, even when her words were those of a man's reasoning, made them
seem gentle with a woman's sentiment,--"why must your road through the
world be so exclusively the stony one? It is not from necessity, it can.
not be from taste; and whatever definition you give to genius, surely it
is not your own inborn genius that dictates to you a constant exclusive
adherence to the commonplace of life."

"Ah, Mademoiselle, do not misrepresent me. I did not say that I could
not sometimes quit the real world for fairyland,--I said that I could not
do so often. My vocation is not that of a poet or artist."

"It is that of an orator, I know," said Isaura, kindling; "so they tell
me, and I believe them. But is not the orator somewhat akin to the poet?
Is not oratory an art?"

"Let us dismiss the word orator; as applied to English public life, it is
a very deceptive expression. The Englishman who wishes to influence his
countrymen by force of words spoken must mix with them in their beaten
thoroughfares; must make himself master of their practical views and
interests; must be conversant with their prosaic occupations and
business; must understand how to adjust their loftiest aspirations to
their material welfare; must avoid as the fault most dangerous to himself
and to others that kind of eloquence which is called oratory in France,
and which has helped to make the French the worst politicians in Europe.
Alas! Mademoiselle, I fear that an English statesman would appear to you
a very dull orator."

"I see that I spoke foolishly,--yes, you show me that the world of the
statesman lies apart from that of the artist. Yet--"

"Yet what?"

"May not the ambition of both be the same?"

"How so?"

"To refine the rude, to exalt the mean; to identify their own fame with
some new beauty, some new glory, added to the treasure-house of all."

Graham bowed his head reverently, and then raised it with the flush of
enthusiasm on his cheek and brow.

"Oh, Mademoiselle," he exclaimed, "what a sure guide and what a noble
inspirer to a true Englishman's ambition nature has fitted you to be,
were it not--" He paused abruptly.

This outburst took Isaura utterly by surprise. She had been accustomed
to the language of compliment till it had begun to pall, but a compliment
of this kind was the first that had ever reached her ear. She had no
words in answer to it; involuntarily she placed her hand on her heart as
if to still its beatings. But the unfinished exclamation, "Were it not,"
troubled her more than the preceding words had flattered, and
mechanically she murmured, "Were it not--what?"

"Oh," answered Graham, affecting a tone of gayety, "I felt too ashamed of
my selfishness as man to finish my sentence."

"Do so, or I shall fancy you refrained lest you might wound me as woman."

"Not so; on the contrary, had I gone on it would have been to say that a
woman of your genius, and more especially of such mastery in the most
popular and fascinating of all arts, could not be contented if she
inspired nobler thoughts in a single breast,--she must belong to the
public, or rather the public must belong to her; it is but a corner of
her heart that an individual can occupy, and even that individual must
merge his existence in hers, must be contented to reflect a ray of the
light she sheds on admiring thousands. Who could dare to say to you,
'Renounce your career; confine your genius, your art, to the petty circle
of home'? To an actress, a singer, with whose fame the world rings, home
would be a prison. Pardon me, pardon--"

Isaura had turned away her face to hide tears that would force their way;
but she held out her hand to him with a childlike frankness, and said
softly, "I am not offended." Graham did not trust himself to continue
the same strain of conversation. Breaking into a new subject, he said,
after a constrained pause, "Will you think it very impertinent in so new
an acquaintance, if I ask how it is that you, an Italian, know our
language as a native; and is it by Italian teachers that you have been
trained to think and to feel?"

"Mr. Selby, my second father, was an Englishman, and did not speak any
other language with comfort to himself. He was very fond of me; and had
he been really my father I could not have loved him more. We were
constant companions till--till I lost him."

"And no mother left to console you!"

Isaura shook her head mournfully, and the Venosta here re-entered.
Graham felt conscious that he had already stayed too long, and took
leave.

They knew that they were to meet that evening at the Savarins'.

To Graham that thought was not one of unmixed pleasure; the more he knew
of Isaura, the more he felt self-reproach that he had allowed himself to
know her at all.

But after he had left, Isaura sang low to herself the song which had so
affected her listener; then she fell into abstracted revery, but she felt
a strange and new sort of happiness. In dressing for M. Savarin's
dinner, and twining the classic ivy wreath in her dark locks, her Italian
servant exclaimed, "How beautiful the Signorina looks to-night!"

CHAPTER III.

M. Savarin was one of the most brilliant of that galaxy of literary men
which shed lustre on the reign of Louis Philippe.

His was an intellect peculiarly French in its lightness and grace.
Neither England nor Germany nor America has produced any resemblance to
it. Ireland has, in Thomas Moore; but then in Irish genius there is so
much that is French.

M. Savarin was free from the ostentatious extravagance which had come
into vogue with the Empire. His house and establishment were modestly
maintained within the limit of an income chiefly, perhaps entirely,
derived from literary profits.

Though he gave frequent dinners, it was but to few at a time, and without
show or pretence. Yet the dinners, though simple, were perfect of their
kind; and the host so contrived to infuse his own playful gayety into the
temper of his guests, that the feasts at his house were considered the
pleasantest at Paris. On this occasion the party extended to ten, the
largest number his table admitted.

All the French guests belonged to the Liberal party, though in changing
tints of the tricolor. _Place aux dames_! first to be named were the
Countess de Craon and Madame Vertot, both without husbands. The Countess
had buried the Count, Madame Vertot had separated from Monsieur. The
Countess was very handsome, but she was sixty; Madame Vertot was twenty
years younger, but she was very plain. She had quarrelled with the
distinguished author for whose sake she had separated from Monsieur, and
no man had since presumed to think that he could console a lady so plain
for the loss of an author so distinguished.

Both these ladies were very clever. The Countess had written lyrical
poems entitled "Cries of Liberty," and a drama of which Danton was the
hero, and the moral too revolutionary for admission to the stage; but at
heart the Countess was not at all a revolutionist,--the last person in
the world to do or desire anything that could bring a washerwoman an inch
nearer to a countess. She was one of those persons who play with fire in
order to appear enlightened.

Madame Vertot was of severer mould. She had knelt at the feet of M.
Thiers, and went into the historico-political line. She had written a
remarkable book upon the modern Carthage (meaning England), and more
recently a work that had excited much attention upon the Balance of
Power, in which she proved it to be the interest of civilization and the
necessity of Europe that Belgium should be added to France, and Prussia
circumscribed to the bounds of its original margraviate. She showed how
easily these two objects could have been effected by a constitutional
monarch instead of an egotistical Emperor. Madame Vertot was a decided
Orleanist.

Both these ladies condescended to put aside authorship in general
society. Next amongst our guests let me place the Count de Passy and
_Madame son espouse_. The Count was seventy-one, and, it is needless to
add, a type of Frenchman rapidly vanishing, and not likely to find itself
renewed. How shall I describe him so as to make my English reader
understand? Let me try by analogy. Suppose a man of great birth and
fortune, who in his youth had been an enthusiastic friend of Lord Byron
and a jocund companion of George IV.; who had in him an immense degree of
lofty romantic sentiment with an equal degree of well-bred worldly
cynicism, but who, on account of that admixture, which is so rare, kept a
high rank in either of the two societies into which, speaking broadly,
civilized life divides itself,--the romantic and the cynical. The Count
de Passy had been the most ardent among the young disciples of
Chateaubriand, the most brilliant among the young courtiers of Charles X.
Need I add that he had been a terrible lady-killer?

But in spite of his admiration of Chateaubriand and his allegiance to
Charles X., the Count had been always true to those caprices of the
French noblesse from which he descended,--caprices which destroyed them
in the old Revolution; caprices belonging to the splendid ignorance of
their nation in general and their order in particular. Speaking without
regard to partial exceptions, the French _gentilhomme_ is essentially a
Parisian; a Parisian is essentially impressionable to the impulse or
fashion of the moment. Is it _a la mode_ for the moment to be Liberal or
anti-Liberal? Parisians embrace and kiss each other, and swear through
life and death to adhere forever to the mode of the moment. The Three
Days were the mode of the moment,--the Count de Passy became an
enthusiastic Orleanist. Louis Philippe was very gracious to him. He was
decorated; he was named _prefet_ of his department; he was created
senator; he was about to be sent Minister to a German Court when Louis
Philippe fell. The Republic was proclaimed. The Count caught the
popular contagion, and after exchanging tears and kisses with patriots
whom a week before he had called _canaille_, he swore eternal fidelity to
the Republic. The fashion of the moment suddenly became Napoleonic, and
with the _coup d'etat_ the Republic was metamorphosed into an Empire.
The Count wept on the bosoms of all the _Vieilles Moustaches_ he could
find, and rejoiced that the sun of Austerlitz had re-arisen. But after
the affair of Mexico the sun of Austerlitz waxed very sickly.
Imperialism was fast going out of fashion. The Count transferred his
affection to Jules Favre, and joined the ranks of the advanced Liberals.
During all these political changes, the Count had remained very much the
same man in private life; agreeable, good-natured, witty, and, above all,
a devotee of the fair sex. When he had reached the age of sixty-eight he
was still _fort bel homme_, unmarried, with a grand presence and charming
manner. At that age he said, "Je me range," and married a young lady of
eighteen. She adored her husband, and was wildly jealous of him; while
the Count did not seem at all jealous of her, and submitted to her
adoration with a gentle shrug of the shoulders.

The three other guests who, with Graham and the two Italian ladies, made
up the complement of ten, were the German Count von Rudesheim, a
celebrated French physician named Bacourt, and a young author whom
Savarin had admitted into his clique and declared to be of rare promise.
This author, whose real name was Gustave Rameau, but who, to prove, I
suppose, the sincerity of that scorn for ancestry which he professed,
published his verses under the patrician designation of Alphonse de
Valcour, was about twenty-four, and might have passed at the first glance
for younger; but, looking at him closely, the signs of old age were
already stamped on his visage.

He was undersized, and of a feeble slender frame. In the eyes of women
and artists the defects of his frame were redeemed by the extraordinary
beauty of the face. His black hair, carefully parted in the centre, and
worn long and flowing, contrasted the whiteness of a high though narrow
forehead, and the delicate pallor of his cheeks. His feature, were very
regular, his eyes singularly bright; but the expression of the face spoke
of fatigue and exhaustion; the silky locks were already thin, and
interspersed with threads of silver; the bright eyes shone out from
sunken orbits; the lines round the mouth were marked as they are in the
middle age of one who has lived too fast.

It was a countenance that might have excited a compassionate and tender
interest but for something arrogant and supercilious in the expression,-
something that demanded not tender pity but enthusiastic admiration. Yet
that expression was displeasing rather to men than to women; and one
could well conceive that, among the latter, the enthusiastic admiration
it challenged would be largely conceded.

The conversation at dinner was in complete contrast to that at the
Americans' the day before. There the talk, though animated, had been
chiefly earnest and serious; here it was all touch and go, sally and
repartee. The subjects were the light on lots and lively anecdotes of
the day, not free from literature and politics, but both treated as
matters of persiflage, hovered round with a jest and quitted with an
epigram. The two French lady authors, the Count de Passy, the physician,
and the host far outspoke all the other guests. Now and then, however,
the German Count struck in with an ironical remark condensing a great
deal of grave wisdom, and the young author with ruder and more biting
sarcasm. If the sarcasm told, he showed his triumph by a low-pitched
laugh; if it failed, he evinced his displeasure by a contemptuous sneer
or a grim scowl.

Isaura and Graham were not seated near each other, and were for the most
part contented to be listeners.

On adjourning to the salon after dinner, Graham, however, was approaching
the chair in which Isaura had placed herself, when the young author,
forestalling him, dropped into the seat next to her, and began a
conversation in a voice so low that it might have passed for a whisper.
The Englishman drew back and observed them. He soon perceived, with a
pang of jealousy not unmingled with scorn, that the author's talk
appeared to interest Isaura. She listened with evident attention; and
when she spoke in return, though Graham did not hear her words, he could
observe on her expressive countenance an increased gentleness of aspect.

"I hope," said the physician, joining Graham, as most of the other guests
gathered round Savarin, who was in his liveliest vein of anecdote and
wit,--"I hope that the fair Italian will not allow that ink-bottle imp to
persuade her that she has fallen in love with him."

"Do young ladies generally find him so seductive?" asked Graham, with a
forced smile.

"Probably enough. He has the reputation of being very clever and very
wicked, and that is a sort of character which has the serpent's
fascination for the daughters of Eve."

"Is the reputation merited?"

"As to the cleverness, I am not a fair judge. I dislike that sort of
writing which is neither manlike nor womanlike, and in which young Rameau
excels. He has the knack of finding very exaggerated phrases by which to
express commonplace thoughts. He writes verses about love in words so
stormy that you might fancy that Jove was descending upon Semele; but
when you examine his words, as a sober pathologist like myself is
disposed to do, your fear for the peace of households vanishes,--they are
Fox et proeterea nihil; no man really in love would use them. He writes
prose about the wrongs of humanity. You feel for humanity; you say,
'Grant the wrongs, now for the remedy,'--and you find nothing but
balderdash. Still I am bound to say that both in verse and prose Gustave
Rameau is in unison with a corrupt taste of the day, and therefore he is
coming into vogue. So much as to his writings; as to his wickedness, you
have only to look at him to feel sure that he is not a hundredth part so
wicked as he wishes to seem. In a word, then, M. Gustave Rameau is a
type of that somewhat numerous class among the youth of Paris, which I
call 'the lost Tribe of Absinthe.' There is a set of men who begin to
live full gallop while they are still boys. As a general rule, they are
originally of the sickly frames which can scarcely even trot, much less
gallop without the spur of stimulants, and no stimulant so fascinates
their peculiar nervous system as absinthe. The number of patients in
this set who at the age of thirty are more worn out than septuagenarians
increases so rapidly as to make one dread to think what will be the next
race of Frenchmen. To the predilection for absinthe young Rameau and the
writers of his set add the imitation of Heine, after, indeed, the manner
of caricaturists, who effect a likeness striking in proportion as it is
ugly. It is not easy to imitate the pathos and the wit of Heine; but it
is easy to imitate his defiance of the Deity, his mockery of right and
wrong, his relentless war on that heroic standard of thought and action
which the writers who exalt their nation intuitively preserve. Rameau
cannot be a Heine, but he can be to Heine what a misshapen snarling dwarf
is to a mangled blaspheming Titan. Yet he interests the women in
general, and he evidently interests the fair Signorina in especial."

Just as Bacourt finished that last sentence, Isaura lifted the head which
had hitherto bent in an earnest listening attitude that seemed to justify
the Doctor's remarks, and looked round. Her eyes met Graham's with the
fearless candour which made half the charm of their bright yet soft
intelligence; but she dropped them suddenly with a half-start and a
change of colour, for the expression of Graham's face was unlike that
which she had hitherto seen on it,--it was hard, stern, and somewhat
disdainful. A minute or so afterwards she rose, and in passing across
the room towards the group round the host, paused at a table covered with
books and prints near to which Graham was standing alone. The Doctor had
departed in company with the German Count.

Isaura took up one of the prints.

"Ah!" she exclaimed, "Sorrento, my Sorrento. Have you ever visited
Sorrento, Mr. Vane?"

Her question and her movement were evidently in conciliation. Was the
conciliation prompted by coquetry, or by a sentiment more innocent and
artless?

Graham doubted, and replied coldly, as he bent over the print,--

"I once stayed there a few days, but my recollection of it is not
sufficiently lively to enable me to recognize its features in this
design."

"That is the house, at least so they say, of Tasso's father; of course
you visited that?"

"Yes, it was a hotel in my time; I lodged there."

"And I too. There I first read 'The Gerusalemine.'" The last words were
said in Italian, with a low measured tone, inwardly and dreamily.

A somewhat sharp and incisive voice speaking in French here struck in and
prevented Graham's rejoinder: "Quel joli dessin! What is it,
Mademoiselle?"

Graham recoiled; the speaker was Gustave Rameau, who had, unobserved,
first watched Isaura, then rejoined her side.

"A view of Sorrento, Monsieur, but it does not do justice to the place.
I was pointing out the house which belonged to Tasso's father."

"Tasso! Hein! and which is the fair Eleonora's?"

"Monsieur," answered Isaura, rather startled at that question, from a
professed _homme de lettres_, "Eleonora did not live at Sorrento."

"Tant pis pour Sorrente," said the homme de lettres, carelessly. "No one
would care for Tasso if it were not for Eleonora."

"I should rather have thought," said Graham, "that no one would have
cared for Eleonora if it were not for Tasso."

Rameau glanced at the Englishman superciliously. "Pardon, Monsieur, in
every age a love-story keeps its interest; but who cares nowadays for le
clinquant du Tasse?"

"Le clinquant du Tasse!" exclaimed Isaura, indignantly.

"The expression is Boileau's, Mademoiselle, in ridicule of the 'Sot de
qualite,' who prefers--

"'Le clinquant du Tasse a tout l'or de Virgile.'

"But for my part I have as little faith in the last as the first."

"I do not know Latin, and have therefore not read Virgil," said Isaura.

"Possibly," remarked Graham, "Monsieur does not know Italian, and has
therefore not read Tasso."

"If that be meant in sarcasm," retorted Rameau, "I construe it as a
compliment. A Frenchman who is contented to study the masterpieces of
modern literature need learn no language and read no authors but his
own."

Isaura laughed her pleasant silvery laugh. "I should admire the
frankness of that boast, Monsieur, if in our talk just now you had not
spoken as contemptuously of what we are accustomed to consider French
masterpieces as you have done of Virgil and Tasso."

"Ah, Mademoiselle! it is not my fault if you have had teachers of taste
so _rococo_ as to bid you find masterpieces in the tiresome stilted
tragedies of Corneille and Racine. Poetry of a court, not of a people,
one simple novel, one simple stanza that probes the hidden recesses of
the human heart, reveals the sores of this wretched social state,
denounces the evils of superstition, kingcraft, and priestcraft, is worth
a library of the rubbish which pedagogues call 'the classics.' We agree,
at least, in one thing, Mademoiselle; we both do homage to the genius of
your friend Madame de Grantmesnil."

"Your friend, Signorina!" cried Graham, incredulously; "is Madame de
Grantmesnil your friend?"

"The dearest I have in the world."

Graham's face darkened; he turned away in silence, and in another minute
vanished from the room, persuading himself that he felt not one pang of
jealousy in leaving Gustave Rameau by the side of Isaura. "Her dearest
friend Madame de Grantmesnil!" he muttered.

A word now on Isaura's chief correspondent. Madame de Grantmesnil was a
woman of noble birth and ample fortune. She had separated from her
husband in the second year after marriage. She was a singularly eloquent
writer, surpassed among contemporaries of her sex in popularity and
renown only by Georges Sand.

At least as fearless as that great novelist in the frank exposition of
her views, she had commenced her career in letters by a work of
astonishing power and pathos, directed against the institution of
marriage as regulated in Roman Catholic communities. I do not know that
it said more on this delicate subject than the English Milton has said;
but then Milton did not write for a Roman Catholic community, nor adopt a
style likely to captivate the working classes. Madame de Grantmesnil's
first book was deemed an attack on the religion of the country, and
captivated those among the working classes who had already abjured that
religion. This work was followed up by others more or less in defiance
of "received opinions,"--some with political, some with social
revolutionary aim and tendency, but always with a singular purity of
style. Search all her books, and however you might revolt from her
doctrine, you could not find a hazardous expression. The novels of
English young ladies are naughty in comparison. Of late years, whatever
might be hard or audacious in her political or social doctrines softened
itself into charm amid the golden haze of romance. Her writings had
grown more and more purely artistic,--poetizing what is good and
beautiful in the realities of life rather than creating a false ideal out
of what is vicious and deformed. Such a woman, separated young from her
husband, could not enunciate such opinions and lead a life so independent
and uncontrolled as Madame de Grantmesnil had done, without scandal,
without calumny. Nothing, however, in her actual life had ever been so
proved against her as to lower the high position she occupied in right of
birth, fortune, renown. Wherever she went she was _fetee_, as in England
foreign princes, and in America foreign authors, are _fetes_. Those who
knew her well concurred in praise of her lofty, generous, lovable
qualities. Madame de Grantmesnil had known Mr. Selby; and when, at his
death, Isaura, in the innocent age between childhood and youth, had been
left the most sorrowful and most lonely creature on the face of the
earth, this famous woman, worshipped by the rich for her intellect,
adored by the poor for her beneficence, came to the orphan's friendless
side, breathing love once more into her pining heart, and waking for the
first time the desires of genius, the aspirations of art, in the dim
self-consciousness of a soul between sleep and waking.

But, my dear Englishman, put yourself in Graham's place, and suppose that
you were beginning to fall in love with a girl whom for many good reasons
you ought not to marry; suppose that in the same hour in which you were
angrily conscious of jealousy on account of a man whom it wounds your
self-esteem to consider a rival, the girl tells you that her dearest
friend is a woman who is famed for her hostility to the institution of
marriage!

CHAPTER IV.

On the same day in which Graham dined with the Savarins, M. Louvier
assembled round his table the elite of the young Parisians who
constituted the oligarchy of fashion, to meet whom he had invited his new
friend the Marquis de Rochebriant. Most of them belonged to the
Legitimist party, the noblesse of the faubourg; those who did not,
belonged to no political party at all,--indifferent to the cares of
mortal States as the gods of Epicurus. Foremost among this _Jeunesse
doree_ were Alain's kinsmen, Raoul and Enguerrand de Vandemar. To these
Louvier introduced him with a burly parental bonhomie, as if he were the
head of the family. "I need not bid you, young folks, to make friends
with each other. A Vandemar and a Rochebriant are not made friends,--
they are born friends." So saying he turned to his other guests.

Almost in an instant Alain felt his constraint melt away in the cordial
warmth with which his cousins greeted him. These young men had a
striking family likeness to each other, and yet in feature, colouring,
and expression, in all save that strange family likeness, they were
contrasts. Raoul was tall, and, though inclined to be slender, with
sufficient breadth of shoulder to indicate no inconsiderable strength of
frame. His hair worn short and his silky beard worn long were dark; so
were his eyes, shaded by curved drooping lashes; his complexion was pale,
but clear and healthful. In repose the expression of his face was that
of a somewhat melancholy indolence, but in speaking it became singularly
sweet, with a smile of the exquisite urbanity which no artificial
politeness can bestow; it must emanate from that native high breeding
which has its source in goodness of heart.

Enguerrand was fair, with curly locks of a golden chestnut. He wore no
beard, only a small mustache rather darker than his hair. His complexion
might in itself be called effeminate, its bloom was so fresh and
delicate; but there was so much of boldness and energy in the play of his
countenance, the hardy outline of the lips, and the open breadth of the
forehead, that "effeminate" was an epithet no one ever assigned to his
aspect. He was somewhat under the middle height, but beautifully
proportioned, carried himself well, and somehow or other did not look
short even by the side of tall men. Altogether he seemed formed to be a
mother's darling, and spoiled by women, yet to hold his own among men
with a strength of will more evident in his look and his bearing than it
was in those of his graver and statelier brother.

Both were considered by their young co-equals models in dress, but in
Raoul there was no sign that care or thought upon dress had been
bestowed; the simplicity of his costume was absolute and severe. On his
plain shirt-front there gleamed not a stud, on his fingers there sparkled
not a ring. Enguerrand, on the contrary, was not without pretension in
his attire; the broderie in his shirt-front seemed woven by the Queen of
the Fairies. His rings of turquoise and opal, his studs and wrist-
buttons of pearl and brilliants, must have cost double the rental of
Rochebriant, but probably they cost him nothing. He was one of those
happy Lotharios to whom Calistas make constant presents. All about him
was so bright that the atmosphere around seemed gayer for his presence.

In one respect at least the brothers closely resembled each other,--in
that exquisite graciousness of manner for which the genuine French noble
is traditionally renowned; a graciousness that did not desert them even
when they came reluctantly into contact with _roturiers_ or republicans;
but the graciousness became _egalite, fraternite_, towards one of their
caste and kindred.

"We must do our best to make Paris pleasant to you," said Raoul, still
retaining in his grasp the hand he had taken.

"_Vilain cousin_," said the livelier Enguerrand, "to have been in Paris
twenty-four hours, and without letting us know."

"Has not your father told you that I called upon him?"

"Our father," answered Raoul, "was not so savage as to conceal that fact;
but he said you were only here on business for a day or two, had declined
his invitation, and would not give your address. _Pauvre pere_! we
scolded him well for letting you escape from us thus. My mother has not
forgiven him yet; we must present you to her to-morrow. I answer for
your liking her almost as much as she will like you."

Before Alain could answer dinner was announced. Alain's place at dinner
was between his cousins. How pleasant they made themselves! It was the
first time in which Alain had been brought into such familiar
conversation with countrymen of his own rank as well as his own age. His
heart warmed to them. The general talk of the other guests was strange
to his ear; it ran much upon horses and races, upon the opera and the
ballet; it was enlivened with satirical anecdotes of persons whose names
were unknown to the Provincial; not a word was said that showed the
smallest interest in politics or the slightest acquaintance with
literature. The world of these well-born guests seemed one from which
all that concerned the great mass of mankind was excluded, yet the talk
was that which could only be found in a very polished society. In it
there was not much wit, but there was a prevalent vein of gayety, and the
gayety was never violent, the laughter was never loud; the scandals
circulated might imply cynicism the most absolute, but in language the
most refined. The Jockey Club of Paris has its perfume.

Raoul did not mix in the general conversation; he devoted himself
pointedly to the amusement of his cousin, explaining to him the point of
the anecdotes circulated, or hitting off in terse sentences the
characters of the talkers.

Enguerrand was evidently of temper more vivacious than his brother, and
contributed freely to the current play of light gossip and mirthful
sally.

Louvier, seated between a duke and a Russian prince, said little except
to recommend a wine or an entree, but kept his eye constantly on the
Vandemars and Alain.

Immediately after coffee the guests departed. Before they did so,
however, Raoul introduced his cousin to those of the party most
distinguished by hereditary rank or social position. With these the name
of Rochebriant was too historically famous not to insure respect of its
owner; they welcomed him among them as if he were their brother.

The French duke claimed him as a connection by an alliance in the
fourteenth century; the Russian prince had known the late Marquis, and
trusted that the son would allow him to improve into friendship the
acquaintance he had formed with the father.

Those ceremonials over, Raoul linked his arm in Alain's and said: "I am
not going to release you so soon after we have caught you. You must come
with me to a house in which I at least spend an hour or two every
evening. I am at home there. Bah! I take no refusal. Do not suppose I
carry you off to Bohemia,--a country which, I am sorry to say, Enguerrand
now and then visits, but which is to me as unknown as the mountains of
the moon. The house I speak of is _comme il faut_ to the utmost. It is
that of the Contessa di Rimini,--a charming Italian by marriage, but by
birth and in character _on ne peut plus Francaise_. My mother adores
her."

That dinner at M. Louvier's had already effected a great change in the
mood and temper of Alain de Rochebriant; he felt, as if by magic, the
sense of youth, of rank, of station, which had been so suddenly checked
and stifled, warmed to life within his veins. He should have deemed
himself a boor had he refused the invitation so frankly tendered.

But on reaching the _coupe_ which the brothers kept in common, and seeing
it only held two, he drew back.

"Nay, enter, mon cher," said Raoul, divining the cause of his hesitation;
"Enguerrand has gone on to his club."

CHAPTER V.

"Tell me," said Raoul, when they were in the carriage, "how you came to
know M. Louvier."

"He is my chief mortgagee."

"H'm! that explains it. But you might be in worse hands; the man has a
character for liberality."

"Did your father mention to you my circumstances, and the reason that
brings me to Paris?"

"Since you put the question point-blank, my dear cousin, he did."

"He told you how poor I am, and how keen must be my lifelong struggle to
keep Rochebriant as the home of my race?"

"He told us all that could make us still more respect the Marquis de
Rochebriant, and still more eagerly long to know our cousin and the head
of our house," answered Raoul, with a certain nobleness of tone and
manner.

Alain pressed his kinsman's hand with grateful emotion. "Yet," he said
falteringly, "your father agreed with me that my circumstances would not
allow me to--"

"Bah!" interrupted Raoul, with a gentle laugh; "my father is a very
clever man, doubtless, but he knows only the world of his own day,
nothing of the world of ours. I and Enguerrand will call on you
to-morrow, to take you to my mother, and before doing so, to consult as
to affairs in general. On this last matter Enguerrand is an oracle.
Here we are at the Contessa's."

CHAPTER VI.

The Contessa di Rimini received her visitors in a boudoir furnished with
much apparent simplicity, but a simplicity by no means inexpensive. The
draperies were but of chintz, and the walls covered with the same
material,--a lively pattern, in which the prevalents were rose-colour and
white; but the ornaments on the mantelpiece, the china stored in the
cabinets or arranged on the shelves, the small knickknacks scattered on
the tables, were costly rarities of art.

The Contessa herself was a woman who had somewhat passed her thirtieth
year,--not strikingly handsome, but exquisitely pretty. "There is," said
a great French writer, "only one way in which a woman can be handsome,
but a hundred thousand ways in which she can be pretty;" and it would be
impossible to reckon up the number of ways in which Adeline di Rimini
carried off the prize in prettiness.

Yet it would be unjust to the personal attractions of the Contessa to
class them all under the word "prettiness." When regarded more
attentively, there was an expression in her countenance that might almost
be called divine, it spoke so unmistakably of a sweet nature and an
untroubled soul. An English poet once described her by repeating the old
lines,

"Her face is like the milky way I' the sky,
--A meeting of gentle lights without a name."

She was not alone; an elderly lady sat on an armchair by the fire,
engaged in knitting; and a man, also elderly, and whose dress proclaimed
him an ecclesiastic, sat at the opposite corner, with a large Angora cat
on his lap.

"I present to you, Madame," said Raoul, "my new-found cousin, the
seventeenth Marquis de Rochebriant, whom I am proud to consider on the
male side the head of our house, representing its eldest branch. Welcome
him for my sake,--in future he will be welcome for his own."

The Contessa replied very graciously to this introduction, and made room
for Alain on the divan from which she had risen.

The old lady looked up from her knitting; the ecclesiastic removed the
cat from his lap. Said the old lady, "I announce myself to M. le
Marquis. I knew his mother well enough to be invited to his christening;
otherwise I have no pretension to the acquaintance of a cavalier _si
beau_, being old, rather deaf, very stupid, exceedingly poor--"

"And," interrupted Raoul, "the woman in all Paris the most adored for
_bonte_, and consulted for _savoir vivre_ by the young cavaliers whom she
deigns to receive. Alain, I present you to Madame de Maury, the widow of
a distinguished author and academician, and the daughter of the brave
Henri de Gerval, who fought for the good cause in La Vendee. I present
you also to the Abbe Vertpre, who has passed his life in the vain
endeavour to make other men as good as himself."

"Base flatterer!" said the Abbe, pinching Raoul's ear with one hand,
while he extended the other to Alain. "Do not let your cousin frighten
you from knowing me, Monsieur le Marquis; when he was my pupil, he so
convinced me of the incorrigibility of perverse human nature, that I now
chiefly address myself to the moral improvement of the brute creation.
Ask the Contessa if I have not achieved a _beau succes_ with her Angora
cat. Three months ago that creature had the two worst propensities of
man,--he was at once savage and mean; he bit, he stole. Does he ever
bite now? No. Does he ever steal? No. Why? I have awakened in that
cat the dormant conscience, and that done, the conscience regulates his
actions; once made aware of the difference between wrong and right, the
cat maintains it unswervingly, as if it were a law of nature. But if,
with prodigious labour, one does awaken conscience in a human sinner, it
has no steady effect on his conduct,--he continues to sin all the same.
Mankind at Paris, Monsieur le Marquis, is divided between two classes,-
one bites and the other steals. Shun both; devote yourself to cats."

The Abbe delivered this oration with a gravity of mien and tone which
made it difficult to guess whether he spoke in sport or in earnest, in
simple playfulness or with latent sarcasm.

But on the brow and in the eye of the priest there was a general
expression of quiet benevolence, which made Alain incline to the belief
that he was only speaking as a pleasant humourist; and the Marquis
replied gayly,--

"Monsieur L'Abbe, admitting the superior virtue of cats when taught by so
intelligent a preceptor, still the business of human life is not
transacted by cats; and since men must deal with men, permit me, as a
preliminary caution, to inquire in which class I must rank yourself. Do
you bite or do you steal?"

This sally, which showed that the Marquis was already shaking off his
provincial reserve, met with great success. Raoul and the Contessa
laughed merrily; Madame de Maury clapped her hands, and cried "Bien!"

The Abbe replied, with unmoved gravity, "Both. I am a priest; it is my
duty to bite the bad and steal from the good, as you will see, Monsieur
le Marquis, if you will glance at this paper."

Here he handed to Alain a memorial on behalf of an afflicted family who
had been burnt out of their home, and reduced from comparative ease to
absolute want. There was a list appended of some twenty subscribers, the
last being the Contessa, fifty francs, and Madame de Maury, five.

"Allow me, Marquis," said the Abbe, "to steal from you. Bless you two-
fold, _mon fils_!" (taking the napoleon Alain extended to him) "first for
your charity; secondly, for the effect of its example upon the heart of
your cousin. Raoul de Vandemar, stand and deliver. Bah! what! only ten
francs."

Raoul made a sign to the Abbe, unperceived by the rest, as he answered,
"Abbe, I should excel your expectations of my career if I always continue
worth half as much as my cousin."

Alain felt to the bottom of his heart the delicate tact of his richer
kinsman in giving less than himself, and the Abbe replied, "Niggard, you
are pardoned. Humility is a more difficult virtue to produce than
charity, and in your case an instance of it is so rare that it merits
encouragement."

The "tea equipage" was now served in what at Paris is called the English
fashion; the Contessa presided over it, the guests gathered round the
table, and the evening passed away in the innocent gayety of a domestic
circle. The talk, if not especially intellectual, was at least not
fashionable. Books were not discussed, neither were scandals; yet
somehow or other it was cheery and animated, like that of a happy family
in a country-house. Alain thought still the better of Raoul that,
Parisian though he was, he could appreciate the charm of an evening so
innocently spent.

On taking leave, the Contessa gave Alain a general invitation to drop in
whenever he was not better engaged.

"I except only the opera nights," said she. "My husband has gone to
Milan on his affairs, and during his absence I do not go to parties; the
opera I cannot resist."

Raoul set Alain down at his lodgings. "Au revoir; tomorrow at one
o'clock expect Enguerrand and myself."

CHAPTER VII.

Raul and Enguerrand called on Alain at the hour fixed. "In the first
place," said Raoul, "I must beg you to accept my mother's regrets that
she cannot receive you to-day. She and the Contessa belong to a society
of ladies formed for visiting the poor, and this is their day; but to-
morrow you must dine with us _en famille_. Now to business. Allow me to
light my cigar while you confide the whole state of affairs to
Enguerrand. Whatever he counsels, I am sure to approve."

Alain, as briefly as he could, stated his circumstances, his mortgages,
and the hopes which his avow had encouraged him to place in the friendly
disposition of M. Louvier. When he had concluded, Enguerrand mused for a
few moments before replying. At last he said, "Will you trust me to call
on Louvier on your behalf? I shall but inquire if he is inclined to take
on himself the other mortgages; and if so, on what terms. Our
relationship gives me the excuse for my interference; and to say truth, I
have had much familiar intercourse with the man. I too am a speculator,
and have often profited by Louvier's advice. You may ask what can be his
object in serving me; he can gain nothing by it. To this I answer, the
key to his good offices is in his character. Audacious though he be as a
speculator, he is wonderfully prudent as a politician. This belle France
of ours is like a stage tumbler; one can never be sure whether it will
stand on its head or its feet. Louvier very wisely wishes to feel
himself safe whatever party comes uppermost. He has no faith in the
duration of the Empire; and as, at all events, the Empire will not
confiscate his millions, he takes no trouble in conciliating
Imperialists. But on the principle which induces certain savages to
worship the devil and neglect the _bon Dieu_, because the devil is
spiteful and the bon Dieu is too beneficent to injure them, Louvier, at
heart detesting as well as dreading a republic, lays himself out to
secure friends with the Republicans of all classes, and pretends to
espouse their cause; next to them, he is very conciliatory to the
Orleanists; lastly, though he thinks the Legitimists have no chance, he
desires to keep well with the nobles of that party, because they exercise
a considerable influence over that sphere of opinion which belongs to
fashion,--for fashion is never powerless in Paris. Raoul and myself are
no mean authorities in salons and clubs, and a good word from us is worth
having.

"Besides, Louvier himself in his youth set up for a dandy; and that
deposed ruler of dandies, our unfortunate kinsman, Victor de Mauleon,
shed some of his own radiance on the money-lender's son. But when
Victor's star was eclipsed, Louvier ceased to gleam. The dandies cut
him. In his heart he exults that the dandies now throng to his
_soirees_.

"Bref, the millionaire is especially civil to me,--the more so as I know
intimately two or three eminent journalists; and Louvier takes pains to
plant garrisons in the press. I trust I have explained the grounds on
which I may be a better diplomatist to employ than your _avoue_; and with
your leave I will go to Louvier at once."

"Let him go," said Raoul. "Enguerrand never fails in anything he
undertakes; especially," he added, with a smile half sad, half tender,
"when one wishes to replenish one's purse."

"I too gratefully grant such an ambassador all powers to treat," said
Alain. "I am only ashamed to consign to him a post so much beneath his
genius," and "his birth" he was about to add, but wisely checked himself.
Enguerrand said, shrugging his shoulders, "You can't do me a greater
kindness than by setting my wits at work. I fall a martyr to _ennui_
when I am not in action;" he said, and was gone.

"It makes me very melancholy at times," said Raoul, flinging away the end
of his cigar, "to think that a man so clever and so energetic as
Enguerrand should be as much excluded from the service of his country as
if he were an Iroquois Indian. He would have made a great diplomatist."

"Alas!" replied Alain, with a sigh, "I begin to doubt whether we
Legitimists are justified in maintaining a useless loyalty to a sovereign
who renders us morally exiles in the land of our birth."

"I have no doubt on the subject," said Raoul. "We are not justified on
the score of policy, but we have no option at present on the score of
honour. We should gain so much for ourselves if we adopted the State
livery and took the State wages that no man would esteem us as patriots;
we should only be despised as apostates. So long as Henry V. lives, and
does not resign his claim, we cannot be active citizens; we must be
mournful lookers-on. But what matters it? We nobles of the old race are
becoming rapidly extinct. Under any form of government likely to be
established in France we are equally doomed. The French people, aiming
at an impossible equality, will never again tolerate a race of
gentilshommes. They cannot prevent, without destroying commerce and
capital altogether, a quick succession of men of the day, who form
nominal aristocracies much more opposed to equality than any hereditary
class of nobles; but they refuse these fleeting substitutes of born
patricians all permanent stake in the country, since whatever estate they
buy must be subdivided at their death my poor Alain, you are making it
the one ambition of your life to preserve to your posterity the home and
lands of your forefathers. How is that possible, even supposing you
could redeem the mortgages? You marry some day; you have children, and
Rochebriant must then be sold to pay for their separate portions. How
this condition of things, while rendering us so ineffective to perform
the normal functions of a noblesse in public life, affects us in private
life, may be easily conceived.

"Condemned to a career of pleasure and frivolity, we can scarcely escape
from the contagion of extravagant luxury which forms the vice of the
time. With grand names to keep up, and small fortunes whereon to keep
them, we readily incur embarrassment and debt. Then neediness conquers
pride. We cannot be great merchants, but we can be small gamblers on the
Bourse, or, thanks to the Credit Mobilier, imitate a cabinet minister,
and keep a shop under another name. Perhaps you have heard that
Enguerrand and I keep a shop. Pray, buy your gloves there. Strange fate
for men whose ancestors fought in the first Crusade--_mais que voulez-
vous_?"

"I was told of the shop," said Alain; "but the moment I knew you I
disbelieved the story."

"Quite true. Shall I confide to you why we resorted to that means of
finding ourselves in pocket-money? My father gives us rooms in his
hotel; the use of his table, which we do not much profit by; and an
allowance, on which we could not live as young men of our class live at
Paris. Enguerrand had his means of spending pocket-money, I mine; but it
came to the same thing,--the pockets were emptied. We incurred debts.
Two years ago my father straitened himself to pay them, saying, 'The next
time you come to me with debts, however small, you must pay them
yourselves, or you must marry, and leave it to me to find you wives.'
This threat appalled us both. A month afterwards, Enguerrand made a
lucky hit at the Bourse, and proposed to invest the proceeds in a shop.
I resisted as long as I could; but Enguerrand triumphed over me, as he
always does. He found an excellent deputy in a _bonne_ who had nursed us
in childhood, and married a journeyman perfumer who understands the
business. It answers well; we are not in debt, and we have preserved our
freedom."

After these confessions Raoul went away, and Alain fell into a mournful
revery, from which he was roused by a loud ring at his bell. He opened
the door, and beheld M. Louvier. The burly financier was much out of
breath after making so steep an ascent. It was in gasps that he
muttered, "Bon jour; excuse me if I derange you." Then entering and
seating himself on a chair, he took some minutes to recover speech,
rolling his eyes staringly round the meagre, unluxurious room, and then
concentrating their gaze upon its occupier.

"_Peste_, my dear Marquis!" he said at last, "I hope the next time I
visit you the ascent may be less arduous. One would think you were in
training to ascend the Himalaya."

The haughty noble writhed under this jest, and the spirit inborn in his
order spoke in his answer.

"I am accustomed to dwell on heights, Monsieur Louvier; the castle of
Rochebriant is not on a level with the town." An angry gleam shot out
from the eyes of the millionaire, but there was no other sign of
displeasure in his answer. "_Bien dit, mon cher_; how you remind me of
your father! Now, give me leave to speak on affairs. I have seen your
cousin Enguerrand de Vandemar. _Homme de moyens_, though _joli garcon_.
He proposed that you should call on me. I said 'no' to the _cher petit_
Enguerrand,--a visit from me was due to you. To cut matters short, M.
Gandrin has allowed me to look into your papers. I was disposed to serve
you from the first; I am still more disposed to serve you now. I
undertake to pay off all your other mortgages, and become sole mortgagee,
and on terms that I have jotted down on this paper, and which I hope will
content you."

He placed a paper in Alain's hand, and took out a box, from which he
extracted a jujube, placed it in his mouth, folded his hands, and
reclined back in his chair, with his eyes half closed, as if exhausted
alike by his ascent and his generosity.

In effect, the terms were unexpectedly liberal. The reduced interest on
the mortgages would leave the Marquis an income of L1,000 a year instead
of L400. Louvier proposed to take on himself the legal cost of transfer,
and to pay to the Marquis 25,000 francs, on the completion of the deed,
as a bonus. The mortgage did not exempt the building-land, as Hebert
desired. In all else it was singularly advantageous, and Alain could but
feel a thrill of grateful delight at an offer by which his stinted income
was raised to comparative affluence.

"Well, Marquis," said Louvier, "what does the castle say to the town?"

"Monsieur Louvier," answered Alain, extending his hand with cordial
eagerness, "accept my sincere apologies for the indiscretion of my
metaphor. Poverty is proverbially sensitive to jests on it. I owe it to
you if I cannot hereafter make that excuse for any words of mine that may
displease you. The terms you propose are most liberal, and I close with
them at once."

"_Bon_," said Louvier, shaking vehemently the hand offered to him; "I
will take the paper to Gandrin, and instruct him accordingly. And now,
may I attach a condition to the agreement which is not put down on
paper? It may have surprised you perhaps that I should propose a
gratuity of 25,000 francs on completion of the contract. It is a droll
thing to do, and not in the ordinary way of business, therefore I must
explain. Marquis, pardon the liberty I take, but you have inspired me
with an interest in your future. With your birth, connections, and
figure you should push your way in the world far and fast. But you
can't do so in a province. You must find your opening at Paris. I wish
you to spend a year in the capital, and live, not extravagantly, like a
nouveau riche, but in a way not unsuited to your rank, and permitting
you all the social advantages that belong to it. These 25,000 francs,
in addition to your improved income, will enable you to gratify my wish
in this respect. Spend the money in Paris; you will want every sou of
it in the course of the year. It will be money well spent. Take my
advice, _cher Marquis. Au plaisir_."

The financier bowed himself out. The young Marquis forgot all the
mournful reflections with which Raoul's conversation had inspired him.
He gave a new touch to his toilette, and sallied forth with the air of a
man on whose morning of life a sun heretofore clouded has burst forth and
bathed the landscape in its light.

CHAPTER VIII.

Since the evening spent at the Savarins', Graham had seen no more of
Isaura. He had avoided all chance of seeing her; in fact, the jealousy
with which he had viewed her manner towards Rameau, and the angry amaze
with which he had heard her proclaim her friendship for Madame de
Grantmesnil, served to strengthen the grave and secret reasons which made
him desire to keep his heart yet free and his hand yet unpledged. But
alas! the heart was enslaved already. It was under the most fatal of all
spells,--first love conceived at first sight. He was wretched; and in
his wretchedness his resolves became involuntarily weakened. He found
himself making excuses for the beloved. What cause had he, after all,
for that jealousy of the young poet which had so offended him; and if in
her youth and inexperience Isaura had made her dearest friend of a great
writer by whose genius she might be dazzled, and of whose opinions she
might scarcely be aware, was it a crime that necessitated her eternal
banishment from the reverence which belongs to all manly love? Certainly
he found no satisfactory answers to such self-questionings. And then
those grave reasons known only to himself, and never to be confided to
another--why he should yet reserve his hand unpledged--were not so
imperative as to admit of no compromise. They might entail a sacrifice,
and not a small one to a man of Graham's views and ambition. But what is
love if it can think any sacrifice, short of duty and honour, too great
to offer up unknown uncomprehended, to the one beloved? Still, while
thus softened in his feelings towards Isaura, he became, perhaps in
consequence of such softening, more and more restlessly impatient to
fulfil the object for which he had come to Paris, the great step towards
which was the discovery of the undiscoverable Louise Duval.

He had written more than once to M. Renard since the interview with that
functionary already recorded, demanding whether Renard had not made some
progress in the research on which he was employed, and had received short
unsatisfactory replies preaching patience and implying hope.

The plain truth, however, was that M. Renard had taken no further pains
in the matter. He considered it utter waste of time and thought to
attempt a discovery to which the traces were so faint and so obsolete.
If the discovery were effected, it must be by one of those chances which
occur without labour or forethought of our own. He trusted only to such
a chance in continuing the charge he had undertaken. But during the last
day or two Graham had become yet more impatient than before, and
peremptorily requested another visit from this dilatory confidant.

In that visit, finding himself pressed hard, and though naturally
willing, if possible, to retain a client unusually generous, yet being on
the whole an honest member of his profession, and feeling it to be
somewhat unfair to accept large remuneration for doing nothing, M. Renard
said frankly, "Monsieur, this affair is beyond me; the keenest agent of
our police could make nothing of it. Unless you can tell me more than
you have done, I am utterly without a clew. I resign, therefore, the
task with which you honoured me, willing to resume it again if you can
give me information that could render me of use."

"What sort of information?"

"At least the names of some of the lady's relations who may yet be
living."

"But it strikes me that, if I could get at that piece of knowledge, I
should not require the services of the police. The relations would tell
me what had become of Louise Duval quite as readily as they would tell a
police agent."

"Quite true, Monsieur. It would really be picking your pockets if I did
not at once retire from your service. Nay, Monsieur, pardon me, no
further payments; I have already accepted too much. Your most obedient
servant."

Graham, left alone, fell into a very gloomy revery. He could not but be
sensible of the difficulties in the way of the object which had brought
him to Paris, with somewhat sanguine expectations of success founded on a
belief in the omniscience of the Parisian police, which is only to be
justified when they have to deal with a murderess or a political
incendiary. But the name of Louise Duval is about as common in France as
that of Mary Smith in England; and the English reader may judge what
would be the likely result of inquiring through the ablest of our
detectives after some Mary Smith of whom you could give little more
information than that she was the daughter of a drawing-master who had
died twenty years ago, that it was about fifteen years since anything had
been heard of her, that you could not say if through marriage or for
other causes she had changed her name or not, and you had reasons for
declining resort to public advertisements. In the course of inquiry so
instituted, the probability would be that you might hear of a great many
Mary Smiths, in the pursuit of whom your employee would lose all sight
and scent of the one Mary Smith for whom the chase was instituted.

In the midst of Graham's despairing reflections his laquais announced M.
Frederic Lemercier.

"_Cher_ Grarm-Varn. A thousand pardons if I disturb you at this late
hour of the evening; but you remember the request you made me when you
first arrived in Paris this season?"

"Of course I do,--in case you should ever chance in your wide round of
acquaintance to fall in with a Madame or Mademoiselle Duval of about the
age of forty, or a year or so less, to let me know; and you did fall in
with two ladies of that name, but they were not the right one, not the
person whom my friend begged me to discover; both much too young."

"_Eh bien, mon cher_. If you will come with me to the _bal champetre_ in
the Champs Elysees to-night, I can show you a third Madame Duval,--her
Christian name is Louise, too, of the age you mention,--though she does
her best to look younger, and is still very handsome. You said your
Duval was handsome. It was only last evening that I met this lady at a
_soiree_ given by Mademoiselle Julie Caumartin, _coryphee distinguee_, in
love with young Rameau."

"In love with young Rameau? I am very glad to hear it. He returns the
love?"

"I suppose so. He seems very proud of it. But apropos of Madame Duval,
she has been long absent from Paris, just returned, and looking out for
conquests. She says she has a great penchant for the English; promises
me to be at this ball. Come."

"Hearty thanks, my dear Lemercier. I am at your service."

CHAPTER IX.

The _bal champetre_ was gay and brilliant, as such festal scenes are at
Paris. A lovely night in the midst of May, lamps below and stars above;
the society mixed, of course. Evidently, when Graham has singled out
Frederic Lemercier from all his acquaintances at Paris to conjoin with
the official aid of M. Renard in search of the mysterious lady, he had
conjectured the probability that she might be found in the Bohemian world
so familiar to Frederic; if not as an inhabitant, at least as an
explorer. Bohemia was largely represented at the _bal champetre_, but
not without a fair sprinkling of what we call the "respectable classes,"
especially English and Americans, who brought their wives there to take
care of them. Frenchmen, not needing such care, prudently left their
wives at home. Among the Frenchmen of station were the Comte de Passy
and the Vicomte de Breze.

On first entering the gardens, Graham's eye was attracted and dazzled by
a brilliant form. It was standing under a festoon of flowers extended
from tree to tree, and a gas jet opposite shone full upon the face,--the
face of a girl in all the freshness of youth. If the freshness owed
anything to art, the art was so well disguised that it seemed nature.
The beauty of the countenance was Hebe-like, joyous, and radiant; and yet
one could not look at the girl without a sentiment of deep mournfulness.
She was surrounded by a group of young men, and the ring of her laugh
jarred upon Graham's ear. He pressed Frederic's arm, and directing his
attention to the girl, asked who she was.

"Who? Don't you know? That is Julie Caumartin. A little while ago her
equipage was the most admired in the Bois, and great ladies condescended
to copy her dress or her coiffure; but she has lost her splendour, and
dismissed the rich admirer who supplied the fuel for its blaze, since
she fell in love with Gustave Rameau. Doubtless she is expecting him
to-night. You ought to know her; shall I present you?"

"No," answered Graham, with a compassionate expression in his manly face.
"So young; seemingly so gay. How I pity her!"

"What! for throwing herself away on Rameau? True. There is a great deal
of good in that girl's nature, if she had been properly trained. Rameau
wrote a pretty poem on her which turned her head and won her heart, in
which she is styled the 'Ondine of Paris,'--a nymph-like type of Paris
itself."

"Vanishing type, like her namesake; born of the spray, and vanishing soon
into the deep," said Graham. "Pray go and look for the Duval; you will
find me seated yonder."

Graham passed into a retired alley, and threw himself on a solitary
bench, while Lemercier went in search of Madame Duval. In a few minutes
the Frenchman reappeared. By his side was a lady well dressed, and as
she passed under the lamps Graham perceived that, though of a certain
age, she was undeniably handsome. His heart beat more quickly. Surely
this was the Louise Duval he sought.

He rose from his seat, and was presented in due form to the lady, with
whom Frederic then discreetly left him. "M. Lemercier tells me that you
think that we were once acquainted with each other."

"Nay, Madame; I should not fail to recognize you were that the case. A
friend of mine had the honour of knowing a lady of your name; and should
I be fortunate enough to meet that lady, I am charged with a commission
that may not be unwelcome to her. M. Lemercier tells me your nom de
bapteme is Louise."

"Louise Corinne, Monsieur."

"And I presume that Duval is the name you take from your parents?"

"No; my father's name was Bernard. I married, when I was a mere child,
M. Duval, in the wine trade at Bordeaux."

"Ah, indeed!" said Graham, much disappointed, but looking at her with a
keen, searching eye, which she met with a decided frankness. Evidently,
in his judgment, she was speaking the truth.

"You know English, I think, Madame," he resumed, addressing her in that
language.

"A leetle; speak un peu."

"Only a little?"

Madame Duval looked puzzled, and replied in French, with a laugh, "Is it
that you were told that I spoke English by your countryman, Milord Sare
Boulby? _Petit scelerat_, I hope he is well. He sends you a commission
for me,--so he ought; he behaved to me like a monster."

"Alas! I know nothing of Milord Sir Boulby. Were you never in England
yourself?"

"Never," with a coquettish side-glance; "I should like so much to go. I
have a foible for the English in spite of that _vilain petit Boulby_.
Who is it gave you the commission for me? Ha! I guess, le Capitaine
Nelton."

"No. What year, Madame, if not impertinent, were you at Aix-la-
Chapelle?"

"You mean Baden? I was there seven years ago, when I met le Capitaine
Nelton, _bel homme aux cheveux rouges_."

"But you have been at Aix?"

"Never."

"I have, then, been mistaken, Madame, and have only to offer my most
humble apologies."

"But perhaps you will favour me with a visit, and we may on further
conversation find that you are not mistaken. I can't stay now, for I am
engaged to dance with the Belgian of whom, no doubt, M. Lemercier has
told you."

"No, Madame, he has not."

"Well, then, he will tell you. The Belgian is very jealous; but I am
always at home between three and four; this is my card."

Graham eagerly took the card, and exclaimed, "Is this you're your own
handwriting, Madame?"

"Yes, indeed."

"_Tres belle ecriture_," said Graham, and receded with a ceremonious bow.
"Anything so unlike her handwriting! Another disappointment," muttered
the Englishman as the lady went back to the ball.

A few minutes later Graham joined Lemercier, who was talking with De
Passy and De Breze.

"Well," said Lemercier, when his eye rested on Graham, "I hit the right
nail on the head this time, eh?"

Graham shook his head.

"What! is she not the right Louise Duval?"

"Certainly not."

The Count de Passy overheard the name, and turned. "Louise Duval," he
said; "does Monsieur Vane know a Louise Duval?"

"No; but a friend asked me to inquire after a lady of that name whom he
had met many years ago at Paris." The Count mused a moment, and said,
"Is it possible that your friend knew the family De Mauleon?"

"I really can't say. What then?"

"The old Vicomte de Mauleon was one of my most intimate associates. In
fact, our houses are connected. And he was extremely grieved, poor man,
when his daughter Louise married her drawing-master, Auguste Duval."

"Her drawing-master, Auguste Duval? Pray say on. I think the Louise
Duval my friend knew must have been her daughter. She was the only child
of a drawing-master or artist named Auguste Duval, and probably enough
her Christian name would have been derived from her mother. A
Mademoiselle de Mauleon, then, married M. Auguste Duval?"

"Yes; the old Vicomte had espoused _en premieres noces_ Mademoiselle
Camille de Chavigny, a lady of birth equal to his own; had by her one
daughter, Louise. I recollect her well,--a plain girl, with a high nose
and a sour expression. She was just of age when the first Vicomtesse
died, and by the marriage settlement she succeeded at once to her
mother's fortune, which was not large. The Vicomte was, however, so poor
that the loss of that income was no trifle to him. Though much past
fifty, he was still very handsome. Men of that generation did not age
soon, Monsieur," said the Count, expanding his fine chest and laughing
exultingly.

"He married, _en secondes noces_, a lady of still higher birth than the
first, and with a much larger _dot_. Louise was indignant at this, hated
her stepmother; and when a son was born by the second marriage she left
the paternal roof, went to reside with an old female relative near the
Luxembourg, and there married this drawing-master. Her father and the
family did all they could to prevent it; but in these democratic days a
woman who has attained her majority can, if she persist in her
determination, marry to please herself and disgrace her ancestors. After
that _mesalliance_ her father never would see her again. I tried in vain
to soften him. All his parental affections settled on his handsome
Victor.

"Ah! you are too young to have known Victor de Mauleon during his short
reign at Paris, as _roi des viveurs_."

"Yes, he was before my time; but I have heard of him as a young man of
great fashion; said to be very clever, a duellist, and a sort of Don
Juan."

"Exactly."

"And then I remember vaguely to have heard that he committed, or was said
to have committed, some villanous action connected with a great lady's
jewels, and to have left Paris in consequence."

"Ah, yes; a sad scrape. At that time there was a political crisis; we
were under a Republic; anything against a noble was believed. But I am
sure Victor de Mauleon was not the man to commit a larceny. However, it
is quite true that he left Paris, and I don't know what has become of him
since." Here he touched De Breze, who, though still near, had not been
listening to this conversation, but interchanging jest and laughter with
Lemercier on the motley scene of the dance.

"De Breze, have you ever heard what became of poor dear Victor de
Mauleon?--you knew him."

"Knew him? I should think so. Who could be in the great world and not
know _le beau_ Victor? No; after he vanished I never heard more of him;
doubtless long since dead. A good-hearted fellow in spite of all his
sins."

"My dear Monsieur de Breze, did you know his half-sister?" asked Graham,
--"a Madame Duval?"

"No. I never heard he had a half-sister. Halt there; I recollect that I
met Victor once, in the garden at Versailles, walking arm-in-arm with the
most beautiful girl I ever saw; and when I complimented him afterwards at
the Jockey Club on his new conquest, he replied very gravely that the
young lady was his niece. 'Niece!' said I; 'why, there can't be more
than five or six years between you.' 'About that, I suppose,' said he;
'my half-sister, her mother, was more than twenty years older than I at
the time of my birth.' I doubted the truth of his story at the time; but
since you say he really had a sister, my doubt wronged him."

"Have you never seen that same young lady since?"

"Never."

"How many years ago was this?"

"Let me see, about twenty or twenty-one years ago. How time flies!"

Graham still continued to question, but could learn no further
particulars. He turned to quit the gardens just as the band was striking
up for a fresh dance, a wild German waltz air; and mingled with that
German music his ear caught the sprightly sounds of the French laugh, one
laugh distinguished from the rest by a more genuine ring of light-hearted
joy, the laugh that he had heard on entering the gardens, and the sound
of which had then saddened him. Looking towards the quarter from which
it came, he again saw the "Ondine of Paris." She was not now the centre
of a group. She had just found Gustave Rameau, and was clinging to his
arm with a look of happiness in her face, frank and innocent as a
child's; and so they passed amid the dancers down a solitary lamplit
alley, till lost to the Englishman's lingering gaze.

CHAPTER X.

The next morning Graham sent again for M. Renard. "Well," he cried, when
that dignitary appeared and took a seat beside him, "chance has favoured
me."

"I always counted on chance, Monsieur. Chance has more wit in its little
finger than the Paris police in its whole body."

"I have ascertained the relations, on the mother's side, of Louise Duval,
and the only question is how to get at them." Here Graham related what
he had heard, and ended by saying, "This Victor de Mauleon is therefore
my Louise Duval's uncle. He was, no doubt, taking charge of her in the
year that the persons interested in her discovery lost sight of her in
Paris; and surely he must know what became of her afterwards."

"Very probably; and chance may befriend us yet in the discovery of Victor
de Mauleon. You seem not to know the particulars of that story about the
jewels which brought him into some connection with the police, and
resulted in his disappearance from Paris."

"No; tell me the particulars."

"Victor de Mauleon was heir to some 60,000 or 70,000 francs a year,
chiefly on the mother's side; for his father, though the representative
of one of the most ancient houses in Normandy, was very poor, having
little of his own except the emoluments of an appointment in the Court of
Louis Philippe.

"But before, by the death of his parents, Victor came into that
inheritance, he very largely forestalled it. His tastes were
magnificent. He took to 'sport,' kept a famous stud, was a great
favourite with the English, and spoke their language fluently. Indeed he
was considered very accomplished, and of considerable intellectual
powers. It was generally said that some day or other, when he had sown
his wild oats, he would, if he took to politics, be an eminent man.
Altogether he was a very strong creature. That was a very strong age
under Louis Philippe. The _viveurs_ of Paris were fine types for the
heroes of Dumas and Sue,--full of animal life and spirits. Victor de
Mauleon was a romance of Dumas, incarnated."

"Monsieur Renard, forgive me that I did not before do justice to your
taste in polite literature."

"Monsieur, a man in my profession does not attain even to my humble
eminence if he be not something else than a professional. He must study
mankind wherever they are described, even in _les romans_. To return to
Victor de Mauleon. Though he was a 'sportman,' a gambler, a Don Juan, a
duel list, nothing was ever said against his honour. On the contrary, on
matters of honour he was a received oracle; and even though he had fought
several duels (that was the age of duels), and was reported without a
superior, almost without an equal, in either weapon, the sword or the
pistol, he is said never to have wantonly provoked an encounter, and to
have so used his skill that he contrived never to slay, nor even gravely
to wound, an antagonist.

"I remember one instance of his generosity in this respect; for it was
much talked of at the time. One of your countrymen, who had never
handled a fencing-foil nor fired a pistol, took offence at something
M. de Mauleon had said in disparagement of the Duke of Wellington, and
called him out. Victor de Mauleon accepted the challenge, discharged his
pistol, not in the air--that might have been an affront--but so as to be
wide of the mark, walked up to the lines to be shot at, and when missed,
said, 'Excuse the susceptibility of a Frenchman loath to believe that his
countryman can be beaten save by accident, and accept every apology one
gentleman can make to another for having forgotten the respect due to one
of the most renowned of your national heroes.' The Englishman's name was
Vane. Could it have been your father?"

"Very probably; just like my father to call out any man who insulted the
honour of his country, as represented by its men. I hope the two
combatants became friends?"

"That I never heard; the duel was over; there my story ends."

"Pray go on."

"One day--it was in the midst of political events which would have
silenced most subjects of private gossip--the _beau monde_ was startled
by the news that the Vicomte (he was then, by his father's death,
Vicomte) de Mauleon had been given into the custody of the police on the
charge of stealing the jewels of the Duchesse de (the wife of a
distinguished foreigner). It seems that some days before this event, the
Duc, wishing to make Madame his spouse an agreeable surprise, had
resolved to have a diamond necklace belonging to her, and which was of
setting so old-fashioned that she had not lately worn it, reset for her
birthday. He therefore secretly possessed himself of the key to an iron
safe in a cabinet adjoining her dressing-room (in which safe her more
valuable jewels were kept), and took from it the necklace. Imagine his
dismay when the jeweller in the Rue Vivienne to whom he carried it
recognized the pretended diamonds as imitation paste which he himself had
some days previously inserted into an empty setting brought to him by a
Monsieur with whose name he was unacquainted. The Duchesse was at that
time in delicate health; and as the Duc's suspicions naturally fell on
the servants, especially on the _femme de chambre_, who was in great
favour with his wife, he did not like to alarm Madame, nor through her to
put the servants on their guard. He resolved, therefore, to place the
matter in the hands of the famous --------, who was then the pride and
ornament of the Parisian police. And the very night afterwards the
Vicomte de Mauleon was caught and apprehended in the cabinet where the
jewels were kept, and to which he had got access by a false key, or at
least a duplicate key, found in his possession. I should observe that
M. de Mauleon occupied the entresol in the same hotel in which the upper
rooms were devoted to the Duc and Duchesse and their suite. As soon as
this charge against the Vicomte was made known (and it was known the next
morning), the extent of his debts and the utterness of his ruin (before
scarcely conjectured or wholly unheeded) became public through the medium
of the journals, and furnished an obvious motive for the crime of which
he was accused. We Parisians, Monsieur, are subject to the most
startling reactions of feeling. The men we adore one day we execrate the
next. The Vicomte passed at once from the popular admiration one bestows
on a hero to the popular contempt with which one regards a petty
larcener. Society wondered how it had ever condescended to receive into
its bosom the gambler, the duellist, the Don Juan. However, one
compensation in the way of amusement he might still afford to society for
the grave injuries he had done it. Society would attend his trial,
witness his demeanour at the bar, and watch the expression of his face
when he was sentenced to the, galleys. But, Monsieur, this wretch
completed the measure of his iniquities. He was not tried at all. The
Duc and Duchesse quitted Paris for Spain, and the Duc instructed his
lawyer to withdraw his charge, stating his conviction of the Vicomte's
complete innocence of any other offence than that which he himself had
confessed."

"What did the Vicomte confess? You omitted to state that."

"The Vicomte, when apprehended, confessed that, smitten by an insane
passion for the Duchesse, which she had, on his presuming to declare it,
met with indignant scorn, he had taken advantage of his lodgment in the
same house to admit himself into the cabinet adjoining her dressing-room
by means of a key which he had procured, made from an impression of the
key-hole taken in wax.

"No evidence in support of any other charge against the Vicomte was
forthcoming,--nothing, in short, beyond the _infraction du domicile_
caused by the madness of youthful love, and for which there was no
prosecution. The law, therefore, could have little to say against him.
But society was more rigid; and exceedingly angry to find that a man who
had been so conspicuous for luxury should prove to be a pauper, insisted
on believing that M. de Mauleon was guilty of the meaner, though not
perhaps, in the eyes of husbands and fathers, the more heinous, of the
two offences. I presume that the Vicomte felt that he had got into a
dilemma from which no pistol-shot or sword-thrust could free him, for he
left Paris abruptly, and has not since reappeared. The sale of his stud
and effects sufficed, I believe, to pay his debts, for I will do him the
justice to say that they were paid."

"But though the Vicomte de Mauleon has disappeared, he must have left
relations at Paris, who would perhaps know what has become of him and of
his niece."

"I doubt it. He had no very near relations. The nearest was an old
_celibataire_ of the same name, from whom he had some expectations, but
who died shortly after this esclandre, and did not name the Vicomte in
his will. M. Victor had numerous connections among the highest families,
the Rochebriants, Chavignys, Vandemars, Passys, Beauvilliers; but they
are not likely to have retained any connection with a ruined _vaurien_,
and still less with a niece of his who was the child of a drawing-master.
But now you have given me a clew, I will try to follow it up. We must
find the Vicomte, and I am not without hope of doing so. Pardon me if I
decline to say more at present. I would not raise false expectations;
but in a week or two I will have the honour to call again upon Monsieur."

"Wait one instant. You have really a hope of discovering M. de Mauleon?"

"Yes. I cannot say more at present."

M. Renard departed. Still that hope, however faint it might prove,
served to reanimate Graham; and with that hope his heart, as if a load
had been lifted from its mainspring, returned instinctively to the
thought of Isaura. Whatever seemed to promise an early discharge of the
commission connected with the discovery of Louise Duval seemed to bring
Isaura nearer to him, or at least to excuse his yearning desire to see
more of her, to understand her better. Faded into thin air was the vague
jealousy of Gustave Rameau which he had so unreasonably conceived; he
felt as if it were impossible that the man whom the "Ondine of Paris"
claimed as her lover could dare to woo or hope to win an Isaura. He even
forgot the friendship with the eloquent denouncer of the marriage-bond,
which a little while ago had seemed to him an unpardonable offence. He
remembered only the lovely face, so innocent, yet so intelligent; only
the sweet voice, which had for the first time breathed music into his own
soul; only the gentle hand, whose touch had for the first time sent
through his veins the thrill which distinguishes from all her sex the
woman whom we love. He went forth elated and joyous, and took his way to
Isaura's villa. As he went, the leaves on the trees under which he
passed seemed stirred by the soft May breeze in sympathy with his own
delight. Perhaps it was rather the reverse: his own silent delight
sympathized with all delight in awakening Nature. The lover seeking
reconciliation with the loved one from whom some trifle has unreasonably
estranged him, in a cloudless day of May,--if he be not happy enough to
feel a brotherhood in all things happy,--a leaf in bloom, a bird in
song,--then indeed he may call himself lover, but he does not know what
is love.

BOOK IV.

CHAPTER I.

FROM ISAURA CICOGNA TO MADAME DE GRANTMESNIL.

It is many days since I wrote to you, and but for your delightful note
just received, reproaching me for silence, I should still be under the
spell of that awe which certain words of M. Savarin were well fitted to
produce. Chancing to ask him if he had written to you lately, he said,
with that laugh of his, good-humouredly ironical, "No, Mademoiselle, I am
not one of the _Facheux_ whom Moliere has immortalized. If the meeting
of lovers should be sacred from the intrusion of a third person, however
amiable, more sacred still should be the parting between an author and
his work. Madame de Grantmesnil is in that moment so solemn to a genius
earnest as hers,--she is bidding farewell to a companion with whom, once
dismissed into the world, she can never converse familiarly again; it
ceases to be her companion when it becomes ours. Do not let us disturb
the last hours they will pass together."

These words struck me much. I suppose there is truth in them. I can
comprehend that a work which has long been all in all to its author,
concentrating his thoughts, gathering round it the hopes and fears of his
inmost heart, dies, as it were, to him when he has completed its life for
others, and launched it into a world estranged from the solitude in which
it was born and formed. I can almost conceive that, to a writer like
you, the very fame which attends the work thus sent forth chills your own
love for it. The characters you created in a fairyland, known but to
yourself, must lose something of their mysterious charm when you hear
them discussed and cavilled at, blamed or praised, as if they were really
the creatures of streets and salons.

I wonder if hostile criticism pains or enrages you as it seems to do such
other authors as I have known. M. Savarin, for instance, sets down in
his tablets as an enemy to whom vengeance is due the smallest scribbler
who wounds his self-love, and says frankly, "To me praise is food,
dispraise is poison. Him who feeds me I pay; him who poisons me I break
on the wheel." M. Savarin is, indeed, a skilful and energetic
administrator to his own reputation. He deals with it as if it were a
kingdom,--establishes fortifications for its defence, enlists soldiers to
fight for it. He is the soul and centre of a confederation in which each
is bound to defend the territory of the others, and all those territories
united constitute the imperial realm of M. Savarin. Don't think me an
ungracious satirist in what I am thus saying of our brilliant friend. It
is not I who here speak; it is himself. He avows his policy with the
_naivete_ which makes the charm of his style as writer. "It is the
greatest mistake," he said to me yesterday, "to talk of the Republic of
Letters. Every author who wins a name is a sovereign in his own domain,
be it large or small. Woe to any republican who wants to dethrone me!"
Somehow or other, when M. Savarin thus talks I feel as if he were
betraying the cause of, genius. I cannot bring myself to regard
literature as a craft,--to me it is a sacred mission; and in hearing this
"sovereign" boast of the tricks by which he maintains his state, I seem
to listen to a priest who treats as imposture the religion he professes
to teach. M. Savarin's favourite _eleve_ now is a young contributor to
his journal, named Gustave Rameau. M. Savarin said the other day in my
hearing, "I and my set were Young France; Gustave Rameau and his set are
New Paris."

"And what is the distinction between the one and the other?" asked my
American friend, Mrs. Morley.

"The set of 'Young France,'" answered M. Savarin, "had in it the hearty
consciousness of youth; it was bold and vehement, with abundant vitality
and animal spirits; whatever may be said against it in other respects,
the power of thews and sinews must be conceded to its chief
representatives. But the set of 'New Paris' has very bad health, and
very indifferent spirits. Still, in its way, it is very clever; it can
sting and bite as keenly as if it were big and strong. Rameau is the
most promising member of the set. He will be popular in his time,
because he represents a good deal of the mind of his time,--namely, the
mind and the time of 'New Paris.'"

Do you know anything of this young Rameau's writings? You do not know
himself, for he told me so, expressing a desire, that was evidently very
sincere, to find some occasion on which to render you his homage. He
said this the first time I met him at M. Savarin's, and before he knew
how dear to me are yourself and your fame. He came and sat by me after
dinner, and won my interest at once by asking me if I had heard that you
were busied on a new work; and then, without waiting for my answer, he
launched forth into praises of you, which made a notable contrast to the
scorn with which he spoke of all your contemporaries,--except indeed M.
Savarin, who, however, might not have been pleased to hear his favourite
pupil style him "a great writer in small things." I spare you his
epigrams on Dumas and Victor Hugo and my beloved Lamartine. Though his
talk was showy, and dazzled me at first, I soon got rather tired of it,
even the first time we met. Since then I have seen him very often, not
only at M. Savarin's, but he calls here at least every other day, and we
have become quite good friends. He gains on acquaintance so far that one
cannot help feeling how much he is to be pitied. He is so envious! and
the envious must be so unhappy. And then he is at once so near and so
far from all the things that he envies. He longs for riches and luxury,
and can only as yet earn a bare competence by his labours. Therefore he
hates the rich and luxurious. His literary successes, instead of
pleasing him, render him miserable by their contrast with the fame of the
authors whom he envies and assails. He has a beautiful head, of which he
is conscious, but it is joined to a body without strength or grace. He
is conscious of this too,--but it is cruel to go on with this sketch.
You can see at once the kind of person who, whether he inspire affection
or dislike, cannot fail to create an interest, painful but compassionate.

You will be pleased to hear that Dr. C. considers my health so improved
that I may next year enter fairly on the profession for which I was
intended and trained. Yet I still feel hesitating and doubtful. To give
myself wholly up to the art in which I am told I could excel must
alienate me entirely from the ambition that yearns for fields in which,
alas! it may perhaps never appropriate to itself a rood for culture,--
only wander, lost in a vague fairyland, to which it has not the fairy's
birthright. O thou great Enchantress, to whom are equally subject the
streets of Paris and the realm of Faerie, thou who hast sounded to the
deeps that circumfluent ocean called "practical human life," and hast
taught the acutest of its navigators to consider how far its courses are
guided by orbs in heaven,--canst thou solve this riddle which, if it
perplexes me, must perplex so many? What is the real distinction between
the rare genius and the commonalty of human souls that feel to the quick
all the grandest and divinest things which the rare genius places before
them, sighing within themselves, "This rare genius does but express that
which was previously familiar to us, so far as thought and sentiment
extend"? Nay, the genius itself, however eloquent, never does, never
can, express the whole of the thought or the sentiment it interprets; on
the contrary, the greater the genius is, the more it leaves a something
of incomplete satisfaction on our minds,--it promises so much more than
it performs; it implies so much more than it announces. I am impressed
with the truth of what I thus say in proportion as I re-peruse and
re-study the greatest writers that have come within my narrow range of
reading; and by the greatest writers I mean those who are not exclusively
reasoners (of such I cannot judge), nor mere poets (of whom, so far as
concerns the union of words with music, I ought to be able to judge), but
the few who unite reason and poetry, and appeal at once to the common-
sense of the multitude and the imagination of the few. The highest type
of this union to me is Shakspeare; and I can comprehend the justice of no
criticism on him which does not allow this sense of incomplete
satisfaction augmenting in proportion as the poet soars to his highest.
I ask again, In what consists this distinction between the rare genius
and the commonalty of minds that exclaim, "He expresses what we feel, but
never the whole of what we feel"? Is it the mere power over language, a
larger knowledge of dictionaries, a finer ear for period and cadence, a
more artistic craft in casing our thoughts and sentiments in well-
selected words? Is it true what Buffon says, "that the style is the
man"? Is it true what I am told Goethe said, "Poetry is form"? I cannot
believe this; and if you tell me it is true, then I no longer pine to be
a writer. But if it be not true, explain to me how it is that the
greatest genius is popular in proportion as it makes itself akin to us by
uttering in better words than we employ that which was already within us,
brings to light what in our souls was latent, and does but correct,
beautify, and publish the correspondence which an ordinary reader carries
on privately every day between himself and his mind or his heart. If
this superiority in the genius be but style and form, I abandon my dream
of being something else than a singer of words by another to the music of
another. But then, what then? My knowledge of books and art is
wonderfully small. What little I do know I gather from very few books
and from what I hear said by the few worth listening to whom I happen to
meet; and out of these, in solitude and revery, not by conscious effort,
I arrive at some results which appear to my inexperience original.
Perhaps, indeed, they have the same kind of originality as the musical
compositions of amateurs who effect a cantata or a quartette made up of
borrowed details from great masters, and constituting a whole so original
that no real master would deign to own it. Oh, if I could get you to
understand how unsettled, how struggling my whole nature at this moment
is! I wonder what is the sensation of the chrysalis which has been a
silkworm, when it first feels the new wings stirring within its shell,--
wings, alas! they are but those of the humblest and shortest-lived sort
of moth, scarcely born into daylight before it dies. Could it reason, it
might regret its earlier life, and say, "Better be the silkworm than the
moth."

FROM THE SAME TO THE SAME.

Have you known well any English people in the course of your life? I say
well, for you must have had acquaintance with many. But it seems to me
so difficult to know an Englishman well. Even I, who so loved and
revered Mr. Selby,--I, whose childhood was admitted into his
companionship by that love which places ignorance and knowledge, infancy
and age, upon ground so equal that heart touches heart, cannot say that I
understand the English character to anything like the extent to which I
fancy I understand the Italian and the French. Between us of the
Continent and them of the island the British Channel always flows. There
is an Englishman here to whom I have been introduced, whom I have met,
though but seldom, in that society which bounds the Paris world to me.
Pray, pray tell me, did you ever know, ever meet him? His name is Graham
Vane. He is the only son, I am told, of a man who was a _celebrite_ in
England as an orator and statesman, and on both sides he belongs to the
haute aristocratic. He himself has that indescribable air and mien to
which we apply the epithet 'distinguished.' In the most crowded salon
the eye would fix on him, and involuntarily follow his movements. Yet
his manners are frank and simple, wholly without the stiffness or reserve
which are said to characterize the English. There is an inborn dignity
in his bearing which consists in the absence of all dignity assumed. But
what strikes me most in this Englishman is an expression of countenance
which the English depict by the word 'open,'--that expression which
inspires you with a belief in the existence of sincerity. Mrs. Morley
said of him, in that poetic extravagance of phrase by which the Americans
startle the English, "That man's forehead would light up the Mammoth
Cave." Do you not know, Eulalie, what it is to us cultivators of art--
art being the expression of truth through fiction--to come into the
atmosphere of one of those souls in which Truth stands out bold and
beautiful in itself, and needs no idealization through fiction? Oh, how
near we should be to heaven could we live daily, hourly, in the presence
of one the honesty of whose word we could never doubt, the authority of
whose word we could never disobey! Mr. Vane professes not to understand
music, not even to care for it, except rarely, and yet he spoke of its
influence over others with an enthusiasm that half charmed me once more
back to my destined calling; nay, might have charmed me wholly, but that
he seemed to think that I--that any public singer--must be a creature
apart from the world,--the world in which such men live. Perhaps that is
true.

CHAPTER II.

It was one of those lovely noons towards the end of May in which a rural
suburb has the mellow charm of summer to him who escapes awhile from the
streets of a crowded capital. The Londoner knows its charm when he feels
his tread on the softening swards of the Vale of Health, or, pausing at
Richmond under the budding willow, gazes on the river glittering in the
warmer sunlight, and hears from the villa-gardens behind him the brief
trill of the blackbird. But the suburbs round Paris are, I think, a yet
more pleasing relief from the metropolis; they are more easily reached,
and I know not why, but they seem more rural,--perhaps because the
contrast of their repose with the stir left behind, of their redundance
of leaf and blossom compared with the prim efflorescence of trees in the
Boulevards and Tuileries, is more striking. However that may be, when
Graham reached the pretty suburb in which Isaura dwelt, it seemed to him
as if all the wheels of the loud busy life were suddenly smitten still.
The hour was yet early; he felt sure that he should find Isaura at home.
The garden-gate stood unfastened and ajar; he pushed it aside and
entered. I think I have before said that the garden of the villa was
shut out from the road and the gaze of neighbours by a wall and thick
belts of evergreens; it stretched behind the house somewhat far for the
garden of a suburban villa. He paused when he had passed the gateway,
for he heard in the distance the voice of one singing,--singing low,
singing plaintively. He knew it was the voice of Isaura-_he passed on,
leaving the house behind him, and tracking the voice till he reached the
singer.

Isaura was seated within an arbour towards the farther end of the
garden,--an arbour which, a little later in the year, must indeed be
delicate and dainty with lush exuberance of jessamine and woodbine; now
into its iron trelliswork leaflets and flowers were insinuating their
gentle way. Just at the entrance one white rose--a winter rose that had
mysteriously survived its relations--opened its pale hues frankly to the
noonday sun. Graham approached slowly, noiselessly, and the last note of
the song had ceased when he stood at the entrance of the arbour. Isaura
did not perceive him at first, for her face was bent downward musingly,
as was often her wont after singing, especially when alone; but she felt
that the place was darkened, that something stood between her and the
sunshine. She raised her face, and a quick flush mantled over it as she
uttered his name, not loudly, not as in surprise, but inwardly and
whisperingly, as in a sort of fear.

"Pardon me, Mademoiselle," said Graham, entering; "but I heard your voice
as I came into the garden, and it drew me onward involuntarily. What a
lovely air! and what simple sweetness in such of the words as reached me!
I am so ignorant of music that you must not laugh at me if I ask whose is
the music and whose are the words? Probably both are so well known as to
convict me of a barbarous ignorance."

"Oh, no," said Isaura, with a still heightened colour, and in accents
embarrassed and hesitating. "Both the words and music are by an unknown
and very humble composer, yet not, indeed, quite original,--they have not
even that merit; at least they were suggested by a popular song in the
Neapolitan dialect which is said to be very old."

"I don't know if I caught the true meaning of the words, for they seemed
to me to convey a more subtle and refined sentiment than is common in the
popular songs of southern Italy."

"The sentiment in the original is changed in the paraphrase, and not, I
fear, improved by the change."

"Will you explain to me the sentiment in both, and let me judge which I
prefer?"

"In the Neapolitan song a young fisherman, who has moored his boat under
a rock on the shore, sees a beautiful face below the surface of the
waters; he imagines it to be that of a Nereid, and casts in his net to
catch this supposed nymph of the ocean. He only disturbs the water,
loses the image, and brings up a few common fishes. He returns home
disappointed, and very much enamoured of the supposed Nereid. The next
day he goes again to the same place, and discovers that the face which
had so charmed him was that of a mortal girl reflected on the waters from
the rock behind him, on which she had been seated, and on which she had
her home. The original air is arch and lively; just listen to it." And
Isaura warbled one of those artless and somewhat meagre tunes to which
light-stringed instruments are the fitting accompaniment.

"That," said Graham, "is a different music indeed from the other, which
is deep and plaintive, and goes to the heart."

"But do you not see how the words have been altered? In the song you
first heard me singing, the fisherman goes again to the spot, again and
again sees the face in the water, again and again seeks to capture the
Nereid, and never knows to the last that the face was that of the mortal
on the rock close behind him, and which he passed by without notice every
day. Deluded by an ideal image, the real one escapes from his eye."

"Is the verse that is recast meant to symbolize a moral in love?"

"In love? nay, I know not; but in life, yes,--at least the life of the
artist."

"The paraphrase of the original is yours, Signorina, words and music
both. Am I not right? Your silence answers 'Yes.' Will you pardon me
if I say that, though there can be no doubt of the new beauty you have
given to the old song, I think that the moral of the old was the sounder
one, the truer to human life. We do not go on to the last duped by an
allusion. If enamoured by the shadow on the waters, still we do look
around us and discover the image it reflects."

Isaura shook her head gently, but made no answer. On the table before
her there were a few myrtle-sprigs and one or two buds from the last
winter rose, which she had been arranging into a simple nosegay; she took
up these, and abstractedly began to pluck and scatter the rose-leaves.

"Despise the coming May flowers if you will, they will soon be so
plentiful," said Graham; "but do not cast away the few blossoms which
winter has so kindly spared, and which even summer will not give again;"
and placing his hand on the winter buds, it touched hers,--lightly,
indeed, but she felt the touch, shrank from it, coloured, and rose from
her seat.

"The sun has left this side of the garden, the east wind is rising, and
you must find it chilly here," she said, in an altered tone; "will you
not come into the house?"

"It is not the air that I feel chilly," said Graham, with a half-smile;
"I almost fear that my prosaic admonitions have displeased you."

"They were not prosaic; and they were kind and very wise," she added,
with her exquisite laugh,--laugh so wonderfully sweet and musical. She
now had gained the entrance of the arbour; Graham joined her, and they
walked towards the house. He asked her if she had seen much of the
Savarins since they had met.

"Once or twice we have been there of an evening."

"And encountered, no doubt, the illustrious young minstrel who despises
Tasso and Corneille?"

"M. Rameau? Oh, yes; he is constantly at the Savarins. Do not be severe
on him. He is unhappy, he is struggling, he is soured. An artist has
thorns in his path which lookers-on do not heed."

"All people have thorns in their path, and I have no great respect for
those who want lookers-on to heed them whenever they are scratched. But
M. Rameau seems to me one of those writers very common nowadays, in
France and even in England; writers who have never read anything worth
studying, and are, of course, presumptuous in proportion to their
ignorance. I should not have thought an artist like yourself could have
recognized an artist in a M. Rameau who despises Tasso without knowing
Italian."

Graham spoke bitterly; he was once more jealous.

"Are you not an artist yourself? Are you not a writer? M. Savarin told
me you were a distinguished man of letters."

"M. Savarin flatters me too much. I am not an artist, and I have a great
dislike to that word as it is now hackneyed and vulgarized in England and
in France. A cook calls himself an artist; a tailor does the same; a man
writes a gaudy melodrame, a spasmodic song, a sensational novel, and
straightway he calls Himself an artist, and indulges in a pedantic jargon
about 'essence' and 'form,' assuring us that a poet we can understand
wants essence, and a poet we can scan wants form. Thank heaven, I am not
vain enough to call myself artist. I have written some very dry
lucubrations in periodicals, chiefly political, or critical upon other
subjects than art. But why, a propos of M. Rameau, did you ask me that
question respecting myself?"

"Because much in your conversation," answered Isaura, in rather a
mournful tone, "made me suppose you had more sympathies with art and its
cultivators than you cared to avow; and if you had such sympathies, you
would comprehend what a relief it is to a poor aspirant to art like
myself to come into communication with those who devote themselves to any
art distinct from the common pursuits of the world, what a relief it is
to escape from the ordinary talk of society. There is a sort of
instinctive freemasonry among us, including masters and disciples; and
one art has a fellowship with other arts. Mine is but song and music,
yet I feel attracted towards a sculptor, a painter, a romance-writer, a
poet, as much as towards a singer, a musician. Do you understand why I
cannot contemn M. Rameau as you do? I differ from his tastes in
literature; I do not much admire such of his writings as I have read; I
grant that he overestimates his own genius, whatever that be,--yet I like
to converse with him. He is a struggler upwards, though with weak wings,
or with erring footsteps, like myself."

"Mademoiselle," said Graham, earnestly, "I cannot say how I thank you for
this candour. Do not condemn me for abusing it, if--" he paused.

"If what?"

"If I, so much older than yourself,--I do not say only in years, but in
the experience of life, I whose lot is cast among those busy and
'positive' pursuits, which necessarily quicken that unromantic faculty
called common-sense,--if, I say, the deep interest with which you must
inspire all whom you admit into an acquaintance even as unfamiliar as
that now between us makes me utter one caution, such as might be uttered
by a friend or brother. Beware of those artistic sympathies which you so
touchingly confess; beware how, in the great events of life, you allow
fancy to misguide your reason. In choosing friends on whom to rely,
separate the artist from the human being. Judge of the human being for
what it is in itself. Do not worship the face on the waters, blind to
the image on the rock. In one word, never see in an artist like a M.
Rameau the human being to whom you could intrust the destinies of your
life. Pardon me, pardon me; we may meet little hereafter, but you are a
creature so utterly new to me, so wholly unlike any woman I have ever
before encountered and admired, and to me seem endowed with such wealth
of mind and soul, exposed to such hazard, that--that--" again he paused,
and his voice trembled as he concluded--"that it would be a deep sorrow
to me if, perhaps years hence, I should have to say, 'Alas'! by what
mistake has that wealth been wasted!'"

While they had thus conversed, mechanically they had turned away from the
house, and were again standing before the arbour.

Graham, absorbed in the passion of his adjuration, had not till now
looked into the face of the companion by his side. Now, when he had
concluded, and heard no reply, he bent down and saw that Isaura was
weeping silently.

His heart smote him.

"Forgive me," he exclaimed, drawing her hand into his; "I have had no
right to talk thus; but it was not from want of respect; it was--
it was--"

The hand which was yielded to his pressed it gently, timidly, chastely.

"Forgive!" murmured Isaura; "do you think that I, an orphan, have never
longed for a friend who would speak to me thus?" And so saying, she
lifted her eyes, streaming still, to his bended countenance,--eyes,
despite their tears, so clear in their innocent limpid beauty, so
ingenuous, so frank, so virgin-like, so unlike the eyes of 'any other
woman he had encountered and admired.'

"Alas!" he said, in quick and hurried accents, "you may remember, when we
have before conversed, how I, though so uncultured in your art, still
recognized its beautiful influence upon human breasts; how I sought to
combat your own depreciation of its rank among the elevating agencies of
humanity; how, too, I said that no man could venture to ask you to
renounce the boards, the lamps,--resign the fame of actress, of singer.
Well, now that you accord to me the title of friend, now that you so
touchingly remind me that you are an orphan, thinking of all the perils
the young and the beautiful of your sex must encounter when they abandon
private life for public, I think that a true friend might put the
question, 'Can you resign the fame of actress, of singer?'"

"I will answer you frankly. The profession which once seemed to me so
alluring began to lose its charms in my eyes some months ago. It was
your words, very eloquently expressed, on the ennobling effects of music
and song upon a popular audience, that counteracted the growing distaste
to rendering up my whole life to the vocation of the stage; but now I
think I should feel grateful to the friend whose advice interpreted the
voice of my own heart, and bade me relinquish the career of actress."

Graham's face grew radiant. But whatever might have been his reply was
arrested; voices and footsteps were heard behind. He turned round and
saw the Venosta, the Savarins, and Gustave Rameau.

Isaura heard and saw also, started in a sort of alarmed confusion, and
then instinctively retreated towards the arbour. Graham hurried on to
meet the Signora and the visitors, giving time to Isaura to compose
herself by arresting them in the pathway with conventional salutations.

A few minutes later Isaura joined them, and there was talk to which
Graham scarcely listened, though he shared in it by abstracted
monosyllables. He declined going into the house, and took leave at the
gate. In parting, his eyes fixed themselves on Isaura. Gustave Rameau
was by her side. That nosegay which had been left in the arbour was in
her hand; and though she was bending over it, she did not now pluck and
scatter the rose-leaves. Graham at that moment felt no jealousy of the
fair-faced young poet beside her.

As he walked slowly back, he muttered to himself, "But am I yet in the
position to hold myself wholly free? Am I, am I? Were the sole choice
before me that between her and ambition and wealth, how soon it would be
made! Ambition has no prize equal to the heart of such a woman; wealth
no sources of joy equal to the treasures of her love."

CHAPTER III.

FROM ISAURA CICOGNA TO MADAME DE GRANTMESNIL.

The day after I posted my last, Mr. Vane called on us. I was in our
little garden at the time. Our conversation was brief, and soon
interrupted by visitors,--the Savarins and M. Rameau. I long for your
answer. I wonder how he impressed you, if you have met him; how he would
impress, if you met him now. To me he is so different from all others;
and I scarcely know why his words ring in my ears, and his image rests in
my thoughts. It is strange altogether; for though he is young, he speaks
to me as if he were so much older than I,--so kindly, so tenderly, yet as
if I were a child, and much as the dear Maestro might do, if he thought I
needed caution or counsel. Do not fancy, Eulalie, that there is any
danger of my deceiving myself as to the nature of such interest as he may
take in me. Oh, no! There is a gulf between us there which he does not
lose sight of, and which we could not pass. How, indeed, I could
interest him at all, I cannot guess. A rich, high-born Englishman,
intent on political life; practical, prosaic--no, not prosaic; but still
with the kind of sense which does not admit into its range of vision that
world of dreams which is familiar as their daily home to Romance and to
Art. It has always seemed to me that for love, love such as I conceive
it, there must be a deep and constant sympathy between two persons,--not,
indeed, in the usual and ordinary trifles of taste and sentiment, but in
those essentials which form the root of character, and branch out in all
the leaves and blooms that expand to the sunshine and shrink from the
cold,--that the worldling should wed the worldling, the artist the
artist. Can the realist and the idealist blend together, and hold
together till death and beyond death? If not, can there be true love
between them?

By true love, I mean the love which interpenetrates the soul, and once
given can never die. Oh, Eulalie, answer me, answer!

P. S.--I have now fully made up my mind to renounce all thought of the
stage.

FROM MADAME DE GRANTMESNIL TOISAURA CICOGNA.

MY DEAR CHILD,--how your mind has grown since you left me, the sanguine
and aspiring votary of an art which, of all arts, brings the most
immediate reward to a successful cultivator, and is in itself so divine
in its immediate effects upon human souls! Who shall say what may be the
after-results of those effects which the waiters on posterity presume to
despise because they are immediate? A dull man, to whose mind a ray of
that vague starlight undetected in the atmosphere of workday life has
never yet travelled; to whom the philosopher, the preacher, the poet
appeal in vain,--nay, to whom the conceptions of the grandest master of
instrumental music are incomprehensible; to whom Beethoven unlocks no
portal in heaven; to whom Rossini has no mysteries on earth unsolved by
the critics of the pit,--suddenly hears the human voice of the human
singer, and at the sound of that voice the walls which enclosed him fall.
The something far from and beyond the routine of his commonplace
existence becomes known to him. He of himself, poor man, can make
nothing of it. He cannot put it down on paper, and say the next morning,
"I am an inch nearer to heaven than I was last night;" but the feeling
that he is an inch nearer to heaven abides with him. Unconsciously he is
gentler, he is less earthly, and, in being nearer to heaven, he is
stronger for earth. You singers do not seem to me to understand that you
have--to use your own word, so much in vogue that it has become abused
and trite--a mission! When you talk of missions, from whom comes the
mission? Not from men. If there be a mission from man to men, it must
be appointed from on high.

Think of all this; and in being faithful to your art, be true to
yourself. If you feel divided between that art and the art of the
writer, and acknowledge the first to be too exacting to admit a rival,
keep to that in which you are sure to excel. Alas, my fair child! do not
imagine that we writers feel a happiness in our pursuits and aims more
complete than that which you can command. If we care for fame (and, to
be frank, we all do), that fame does not come up before us face to face,
a real, visible, palpable form, as it does to the singer, to the actress.
I grant that it may be more enduring, but an endurance on the length of
which we dare not reckon. A writer cannot be sure of immortality till
his language itself be dead; and then he has but a share in an uncertain
lottery. Nothing but fragments remains of the Phrynichus who rivalled
AEschylus; of the Agathon who perhaps excelled Euripides; of the Alcaeus,
in whom Horace acknowledged a master and a model; their renown is not in
their works, it is but in their names. And, after all, the names of
singers and actors last perhaps as long. Greece retains the name of
Polus, Rome of Roscius, England of Garrick, France of Talma, Italy of
Pasta, more lastingly than posterity is likely to retain mine. You
address to me a question, which I have often put to myself,--"What is the
distinction between the writer and the reader, when the reader says,
'These are my thoughts, these are my feelings; the writer has stolen
them, and clothed them in his own words'?" And the more the reader says
this, the more wide is the audience, the more genuine the renown, and,
paradox though it seems, the more consummate the originality, of the
writer. But no, it is not the mere gift of expression, it is not the
mere craft of the pen, it is not the mere taste in arrangement of word
and cadence, which thus enables the one to interpret the mind, the heart,
the soul of the many. It is a power breathed into him as he lay in his
cradle, and a power that gathered around itself, as he grew up, all the
influences he acquired, whether from observation of external nature, or
from study of men and books, or from that experience of daily life which
varies with every human being. No education could make two intellects
exactly alike, as no culture can make two leaves exactly alike. How
truly you describe the sense of dissatisfaction which every writer of
superior genius communicates to his admirers! how truly do you feel that
the greater is the dissatisfaction in proportion to the writer's genius,
and the admirer's conception of it! But that is the mystery which makes
--let me borrow a German phrase--the cloud-land between the finite and
the infinite. The greatest philosopher, intent on the secrets of Nature,
feels that dissatisfaction in Nature herself. The finite cannot reduce
into logic and criticism the infinite.

Let us dismiss these matters, which perplex the reason, and approach that
which touches the heart, which in your case, my child, touches the heart
of woman. You speak of love, and deem that the love which lasts--the
household, the conjugal love--should be based upon such sympathies of
pursuit that the artist should wed the artist.

This is one of the questions you do well to address to me; for whether
from my own experience, or from that which I have gained from observation
extended over a wide range of life, and quickened and intensified by the
class of writing that I cultivate, and which necessitates a calm study of
the passions, I am an authority on such subjects, better than most women
can be. And alas, my child, I come to this result: there is no
prescribing to men or to women whom to select, whom to refuse. I cannot
refute the axiom of the ancient poet, "In love there is no wherefore."
But there is a time--it is often but a moment of time--in which love is
not yet a master, in which we can say, "I will love, I will not love."

Now, if I could find you in such a moment, I would say to you, "Artist,
do not love, do not marry, an artist." Two artistic natures rarely
combine. The artistic nature is wonderfully exacting. I fear it is
supremely egotistical,--so jealously sensitive that it writhes at the
touch of a rival. Racine was the happiest of husbands; his wife adored
his genius, but could not understand his plays. Would Racine have been
happy if he had married a Corneille in petticoats? I who speak have
loved an artist, certainly equal to myself. I am sure that he loved me.
That sympathy in pursuits of which you speak drew us together, and became
very soon the cause of antipathy. To both of us the endeavour to
coalesce was misery.

I don't know your M. Rameau. Savarin has sent me some of his writings;
from these I judge that his only chance of happiness would be to marry a
commonplace woman, with _separation de biens_. He is, believe me, but
one of the many with whom New Paris abounds, who because they have the
infirmities of genius imagine they have its strength.

I come next to the Englishman. I see how serious is your questioning
about him. You not only regard him as a being distinct from the crowd of
a salon; he stands equally apart in the chamber of your thoughts,--you do
not mention him in the same letter as that which treats of Rameau and
Savarin. He has become already an image not to be lightly mixed up with
others. You would rather not have mentioned him at all to me, but you
could not resist it. The interest you feel in him so perplexed you, that
in a kind of feverish impatience you cry out to me, "Can you solve the
riddle? Did you ever know well Englishmen? Can an Englishman be
understood out of his island?" etc. Yes, I have known well many
Englishmen; in affairs of the heart they are much like all other men.
No; I do not know this Englishman in particular, nor any one of his name.

Well, my child, let us frankly grant that this foreigner has gained some
hold on your thoughts, on your fancy, perhaps also on your heart. Do not
fear that he will love you less enduringly, or that you will become
alienated from him, because he is not an artist. If he be a strong
nature, and with some great purpose in life, your ambition will fuse
itself in his; and knowing you as I do, I believe you would make an
excellent wife to an Englishman whom you honoured as well as loved; and
sorry though I should be that you relinquished the singer's fame, I
should be consoled in thinking you safe in the woman's best sphere,--
a contented home, safe from calumny, safe from gossip. I never had that
home; and there has been no part in my author's life in which I would
not have given all the celebrity it won for the obscure commonplace of
such woman-lot. Could I move human beings as pawns on a chessboard, I
should indeed say that the most suitable and congenial mate for you, for
a woman of sentiment and genius, would be a well-born and well-educated
German; for such a German unites, with domestic habits and a strong sense
of family ties, a romance of sentiment, a love of art, a predisposition
towards the poetic side of life, which is very rare among Englishmen of
the same class. But as the German is not forthcoming, I give my vote for
the Englishman, provided only you love him. Ah, child, be sure of that.
Do not mistake fancy for love. All women do not require love in
marriage, but without it that which is best and highest in you would
wither and die. Write to me often and tell me all. M. Savarin is right.
My book is no longer my companion. It is gone from me, and I am once
more alone in the world.

Yours affectionately.

P. S.--Is not your postscript a woman's? Does it not require a woman's
postscript in reply? You say in yours that you have fully made up your
mind to renounce all thoughts of the stage. I ask in mine, "What has the
Englishman to do with that determination?"

CHAPTER IV.

Some weeks have passed since Graham's talk with Isaura in the garden; he
has not visited the villa since. His cousins the D'Altons have passed
through Paris on their way to Italy, meaning to stay a few days; they
stayed nearly a month, and monopolized much of Graham's companionship.
Both these were reasons why, in the habitual society of the Duke,
Graham's persuasion that he was not yet free to court the hand of Isaura
became strengthened, and with that persuasion necessarily came a question
equally addressed to his conscience. "If not yet free to court her hand,
am I free to expose myself to the temptation of seeking to win her
affection?" But when his cousin was gone, his heart began to assert its
own rights, to argue its own case, and suggest modes of reconciling its
dictates to the obligations which seemed to oppose them. In this
hesitating state of mind he received the following note:--

VILLA ------, LAC D'ENGHIEN.

MY DEAR MR. VANE,--We have retreated from Paris to the banks of this
beautiful little lake. Come and help to save Frank and myself from
quarrelling with each other, which, until the Rights of Women are firmly
established, married folks always will do when left to themselves,
especially if they are still lovers, as Frank and I are. Love is a
terribly quarrelsome thing. Make us a present of a few days out of your
wealth of time. We will visit Montmorency and the haunts of Rousseau,
sail on the lake at moonlight, dine at gypsy restaurants under trees not
yet embrowned by summer heats, discuss literature and politics,
"Shakspeare and the musical glasses,"--and be as sociable and pleasant as
Boccaccio's tale-tellers, at Fiesole. We shall be but a small party,
only the Savarins, that unconscious sage and humourist Signora Venosta,
and that dimple-cheeked Isaura, who embodies the song of nightingales and
the smile of summer. Refuse, and Frank shall not have an easy moment
till he sends in his claims for thirty millions against the Alabama.

Yours, as you behave,
LIZZIE MORLEY.

Graham did not refuse. He went to Enghien for four days and a quarter.
He was under the same roof as Isaura. Oh, those happy days! so happy
that they defy description. But though to Graham the happiest days he
had ever known, they were happier still to Isaura. There were drawbacks
to his happiness, none to hers,--drawbacks partly from reasons the weight
of which the reader will estimate later; partly from reasons the reader
may at once comprehend and assess. In the sunshine of her joy, all the
vivid colourings of Isaura's artistic temperament came forth, so that
what I may call the homely, domestic woman-side of her nature faded into
shadow. If, my dear reader, whether you be man or woman, you have come
into familiar contact with some creature of a genius to which, even
assuming that you yourself have a genius in its own way, you have no
special affinities, have you not felt shy with that creature? Have you
not, perhaps, felt how intensely you could love that creature, and
doubted if that creature could possibly love you? Now I think that
shyness and that disbelief are common with either man or woman, if,
however conscious of superiority in the prose of life, he or she
recognizes inferiority in the poetry of it. And yet this self-abasement
is exceedingly mistaken. The poetical kind of genius is so grandly
indulgent, so inherently deferential, bows with such unaffected modesty
to the superiority in which it fears it may fail (yet seldom does fail),
--the superiority of common-sense. And when we come to women, what
marvellous truth is conveyed by the woman who has had no superior in
intellectual gifts among her own sex! Corinne, crowned at the Capitol,
selects out of the whole world as the hero of her love no rival poet and
enthusiast, but a cold-blooded, sensible Englishman.

Graham Vane, in his strong masculine form of intellect--Graham Vane, from
whom I hope much, if he live to fulfil his rightful career--had, not
unreasonably, the desire to dominate the life of the woman whom he
selected as the partner of his own; but the life of Isaura seemed to
escape him. If at moments, listening to her, he would say to himself,
"What a companion! life could never be dull with her," at other moments
he would say, "True, never dull, but would it be always safe?" And then
comes in that mysterious power of love which crushes all beneath its
feet, and makes us end self-commune by that abject submission of reason,
which only murmurs, "Better be unhappy with the one you love than happy
with one whom you do not." All such self-communes were unknown to
Isaura. She lived in the bliss of the hour. If Graham could have read
her heart, he would have dismissed all doubt whether he could dominate
her life. Could a Fate or an Angel have said to her, "Choose,--on one
side I promise you the glories of a Catalani, a Pasta, a Sappho, a De
Stael, a Georges Sand, all combined into one immortal name; or, on the
other side, the whole heart of the man who would estrange himself from
you if you had such combination of glories,"--her answer would have
brought Graham Vane to her feet. All scruples, all doubts, would have
vanished; he would have exclaimed, with the generosity inherent in the
higher order of man, "Be glorious, if your nature wills it so. Glory
enough to me that you would have resigned glory itself to become mine."
But how is it that men worth a woman's loving become so diffident when
they love intensely? Even in ordinary cases of love there is so
ineffable a delicacy in virgin woman, that a man, be he how refined
soever, feels himself rough and rude and coarse in comparison; and while
that sort of delicacy was pre-eminent in this Italian orphan, there came,
to increase the humility of the man so proud and so confident in himself
when he had only men to deal with, the consciousness that his
intellectual nature was hard and positive beside the angel-like purity
and the fairy-like play of hers.

There was a strong wish on the part of Mrs. Morley to bring about the
union of these two. She had a great regard and a great admiration for
both. To her mind, unconscious of all Graham's doubts and prejudices,
they were exactly suited to each other. A man of intellect so cultivated
as Graham's, if married to a commonplace English "Miss," would surely
feel as if life had no sunshine and no flowers. The love of an Isaura
would steep it in sunshine, pave it with flowers. Mrs. Morley admitted
--all American Republicans of gentle birth do admit--the instincts which
lead "like" to match with "like," an equality of blood and race. With
all her assertion of the Rights of Woman, I do not think that Mrs. Morley
would ever have conceived the possibility of consenting that the richest
and prettiest and cleverest girl in the States could become the wife of a
son of hers if the girl had the taint of negro blood, even though shown
nowhere save the slight distinguishing hue of her finger-nails. So had
Isaura's merits been threefold what they were and she had been the
wealthy heiress of a retail grocer, this fair Republican would have
opposed (more strongly than many an English duchess, or at least a Scotch
duke, would do, the wish of a son), the thought of an alliance between
Graham Vane and the grocer's daughter! But Isaura was a Cicogna, an
offspring of a very ancient and very noble house. Disparities of
fortune, or mere worldly position, Mrs. Morley supremely despised. Here
were the great parities of alliance,--parities in years and good looks
and mental culture. So, in short, she in the invitation given to them
had planned for the union between Isaura and Graham. To this plan she
had an antagonist, whom she did not even guess, in Madame Savarin. That
lady, as much attached to Isaura as was Mrs. Morley herself, and still
more desirous of seeing a girl, brilliant and parentless, transferred
from the companionship of Signora Venosta to the protection of a husband,
entertained no belief in the serious attentions of Graham Vane. Perhaps
she exaggerated his worldly advantages, perhaps she undervalued the
warmth of his affections; but it was not within the range of her
experience, confined much to Parisian life, nor in harmony with her
notions of the frigidity and morgue of the English national character,
that a rich and high-born young man, to whom a great career in practical
public life was predicted, should form a matrimonial alliance with a
foreign orphan girl, who, if of gentle birth, had no useful connections,
would bring no correspondent dot, and had been reared and intended for
the profession of the stage. She much more feared that the result of any
attentions on the part of such a man would be rather calculated to
compromise the orphan's name, or at least to mislead her expectations,
than to secure her the shelter of a wedded home. Moreover, she had
cherished plans of her own for Isaura's future. Madame Savarin had
conceived for Gustave Rameau a friendly regard, stronger than that which
Mrs. Morley entertained for Graham Vane, for it was more motherly.
Gustave had been familiarized to her sight and her thoughts since he had
first been launched into the literary world under her husband's auspices;
he had confided to her his mortification in his failures, his joy in his
successes. His beautiful countenance, his delicate health, his very
infirmities and defects, had endeared him to her womanly heart. Isaura
was the wife of all others who, in Madame Savarin's opinion, was made for
Rameau. Her fortune, so trivial beside the wealth of the Englishman,
would be a competence to Rameau; then that competence might swell into
vast riches if Isaura succeeded on the stage. She found with extreme
displeasure that Isaura's mind had become estranged from the profession
to which she had been destined, and divined that a deference to the
Englishman's prejudices had something to do with that estrangement. It
was not to be expected that a Frenchwoman, wife to a sprightly man of
letters, who had intimate friends and allies in every department of the
artistic world, should cherish any prejudice whatever against the
exercise of an art in which success achieved riches and renown; but she
was prejudiced, as most Frenchwomen are, against allowing to unmarried
girls the same freedom and independence of action that are the rights of
women--French women--when married; and she would have disapproved the
entrance of Isaura on her professional career until she could enter it as
a wife, the wife of an artist, the wife of Gustave Rameau.

Unaware of the rivalry between these friendly diplomatists and schemers,
Graham and Isaura glided hourly more and more down the current, which as
yet ran smooth. No words by which love is spoken were exchanged between
them; in fact, though constantly together, they were very rarely, and
then but for moments, alone with each other. Mrs. Morley artfully
schemed more than once to give them such opportunities for that mutual
explanation of heart which, she saw, had not yet taken place; with art
more practised and more watchful, Madame Savarin contrived to baffle her
hostess's intention. But, indeed, neither Graham nor Isaura sought to
make opportunities for themselves. He, as we know, did not deem himself
wholly justified in uttering the words of love by which a man of honour
binds himself for life; and she!--what girl pure-hearted and loving truly
does not shrink from seeking the opportunities which it is for the man to
court? Yet Isaura needed no words to tell her that she was loved,--no,
nor even a pressure of the hand, a glance of the eye; she felt it
instinctively, mysteriously, by the glow of her own being in the presence
of her lover. She knew that she herself could not so love unless she
were beloved.

Here woman's wit is keener and truthfuller than man's. Graham, as I have
said, did not feel confident that he had reached the heart of Isaura. He
was conscious that he had engaged her interest, that he had attracted her
fancy; but often, when charmed by the joyous play of her imagination, he
would sigh to himself, "To natures so gifted what single mortal can be
the all in all."

They spent the summer mornings in excursions round the beautiful
neigbbourhood, dined early, and sailed on the calm lake at moonlight.
Their talk was such as might be expected from lovers of books in summer
holidays. Savarin was a critic by profession; Graham Vane, if not that,
at least owed such literary reputation as he had yet gained to essays in
which the rare critical faculty was conspicuously developed.

It was pleasant to hear the clash of these two minds encountering each
other; they differed perhaps less in opinions than in the mode by which
opinions are discussed. The Englishman's range of reading was wider than
the Frenchman's, and his scholarship more accurate; but the Frenchman had
a compact neatness of expression, a light and nimble grace, whether in
the advancing or the retreat of his argument, which covered deficiencies,
and often made them appear like merits. Graham was compelled, indeed, to
relinquish many of the forces of superior knowledge or graver eloquence,
which with less lively antagonists he could have brought into the field,
for the witty sarcasm of Savarin would have turned them aside as pedantry
or declamation. But though Graham was neither dry nor diffuse, and the
happiness at his heart brought out the gayety of humour which had been
his early characteristic, and yet rendered his familiar intercourse
genial and playful, still there was this distinction between his humour
and Savarin's wit,--that in the first there was always something earnest,
in the last always something mocking. And in criticism Graham seemed
ever anxious to bring out a latent beauty, even in writers comparatively
neglected; Savarin was acutest when dragging forth a blemish never before
discovered in writers universally read.

Graham did not perhaps notice the profound attention with which Isaura
listened to him in these intellectual skirmishes with the more glittering
Parisian. There was this distinction she made between him and Savarin,--
when the last spoke she often chimed in with some happy sentiment of her
own; but she never interrupted Graham, never intimated a dissent from his
theories of art, or the deductions he drew from them; and she would
remain silent and thoughtful for some minutes when his voice ceased.
There was passing from his mind into hers an ambition which she imagined,
poor girl, that he would be pleased to think he had inspired, and which
might become a new bond of sympathy between them. But as yet the
ambition was vague and timid,--an idea or a dream to be fulfilled in some
indefinite future.

The last night of this short-lived holiday-time, the party, after staying
out on the lake to a later hour than usual, stood lingering still on the
lawn of the villa; and their host, who was rather addicted to superficial
studies of the positive sciences, including, of course, the most popular
of all, astronomy, kept his guests politely listening to speculative
conjectures on the probable size of the inhabitants of Sirius, that very
distant and very gigantic inhabitant of heaven who has led philosophers
into mortifying reflections upon the utter insignificance of our own poor
little planet, capable of producing nothing greater than Shakspeares and
Newtons, Aristotles and Caesars,--mannikins, no doubt, beside intellects
proportioned to the size of the world in which they flourish.

As it chanced, Isaura and Graham were then standing close to each other
and a little apart from the rest. "It is very strange," said Graham,
laughing low, "how little I care about Sirius. He is the sun of some
other system, and is perhaps not habitable at all, except by Salamanders.
He cannot be one of the stars with which I have established familiar
acquaintance, associated with fancies and dreams and hopes, as most of us
do, for instance, with Hesperus, the moon's harbinger and comrade. But
amid all those stars there is one--not Hesperus--which has always had
from my childhood a mysterious fascination for me. Knowing as little of
astrology as I do of astronomy, when I gaze upon that star I become
credulously superstitious, and fancy it has an influence on my life.
Have you, too, any favourite star?"

"Yes," said Isaura; "and I distinguish it now, but I do not even know its
name, and never would ask it."

"So like me. I would not vulgarize my unknown source of beautiful
illusions by giving it the name it takes in technical catalogues. For
fear of learning that name I never have pointed it out to any one before.
I too at this moment distinguish it apart from all its brotherhood. Tell
me which is yours."

Isaura pointed and explained. The Englishman was startled. By what
strange coincidence could they both have singled out from all the host of
heaven the same favourite star? "Cher Vane," cried Savarin, "Colonel
Morley declares that what America is to the terrestrial system Sirius is
to the heavenly. America is to extinguish Europe, and then Sirius is to
extinguish the world."

"Not for some millions of years; time to look about us," said the
Colonel, gravely. "But I certainly differ from those who maintain that
Sirius recedes from us. I say that he approaches. The principles of a
body so enlightened must be those of progress." Then addressing Graham
in English, he added, "there will be a mulling in this fogified planet
some day, I predicate. Sirius is a keener!"

"I have not imagination lively enough to interest myself in the destinies
of Sirius in connection with our planet at a date so remote," said
Graham, smiling. Then he added in a whisper to Isaura, "My imagination
does not carry me further than to wonder whether this day twelvemonth--
the 8th of July-we two shall both be singling out that same star, and
gazing on it as now, side by side."

This was the sole utterance of that sentiment in which the romance of
love is so rich that the Englishman addressed to Isaura during those
memorable summer days at Enghien.

CHAPTER V.

The next morning the party broke up. Letters had been delivered both to
Savarin and to Graham, which, even had the day for departure not been
fixed, would have summoned them away. On reading his letter, Savarin's
brow became clouded. He made a sign to his wife after breakfast, and
wandered away with her down an alley in the little garden. His trouble
was of that nature which a wife either soothes or aggravates, according
sometimes to her habitual frame of mind, sometimes to the mood of temper
in which she may chance to be,--a household trouble, a pecuniary trouble.

Savarin was by no means an extravagant man. His mode of living, though
elegant and hospitable, was modest compared to that of many French
authors inferior to himself in the fame which at Paris brings a very good
return in francs; but his station itself as the head of a powerful
literary clique necessitated many expenses which were too congenial to
his extreme good-nature to be regulated by strict prudence. His hand was
always open to distressed writers and struggling artists, and his sole
income was derived from his pen and a journal in which he was chief
editor and formerly sole proprietor. But that journal had of late not
prospered. He had sold or pledged a considerable share in the
proprietorship. He had been compelled also to borrow a sum large for
him, and the debt obtained from a retired bourgeois who lent out his
moneys "by way," he said, "of maintaining an excitement and interest in
life," would in a few days become due. The letter was not from that
creditor; but it was from his publisher, containing a very disagreeable
statement of accounts, pressing for settlement, and declining an offer of
Savarin for a new book (not yet begun) except upon terms that the author
valued himself too highly to accept. Altogether, the situation was
unpleasant. There were many times in which Madame Savarin presumed to
scold her distinguished husband for his want of prudence and thrift. But
those were never the times when scolding could be of no use. It could
clearly be of no use now. Now was the moment to cheer and encourage him;
to reassure him as to his own undiminished powers and popularity, for he
talked dejectedly of himself as obsolete and passing out of fashion; to
convince him also of the impossibility that the ungrateful publisher whom
Savarin's more brilliant successes had enriched could encounter the odium
of hostile proceedings; and to remind him of all the authors, all the
artists, whom he in their earlier difficulties had so liberally assisted,
and from whom a sum sufficing to pay the bourgeois creditor when the day
arrived could now be honourably asked and would be readily contributed.
In this last suggestion the homely prudent good-sense of Madame Savarin
failed her. She did not comprehend that delicate pride of honour which,
with all his Parisian frivolities and cynicism, dignified the Parisian
man of genius. Savarin could not, to save his neck from a rope, have
sent round the begging-hat to friends whom he had obliged. Madame
Savarin was one of those women with large-lobed ears, who can be
wonderfully affectionate, wonderfully sensible, admirable wives and
mothers, and yet are deficient in artistic sympathies with artistic
natures. Still, a really good honest wife is such an incalculable
blessing to her lord, that, at the end of the talk in the solitary alley,
this man of exquisite finesse, of the undefinably high-bred temperament,
and, alas! the painful morbid susceptibility, which belongs to the
genuine artistic character, emerged into the open sunlit lawn with his
crest uplifted, his lip curved upward in its joyous mockery, and
perfectly persuaded that somehow or other he should put down the
offensive publisher, and pay off the unoffending creditor when the day
for payment came. Still he had judgment enough to know that to do this
he must get back to Paris, and could not dawdle away precious hours in
discussing the principles of poetry with Graham Vane.

There was only one thing, apart from "the begging-hat," in which Savarin
dissented from his wife.--She suggested his starting a new journal in
conjunction with Gustave Rameau, upon whose genius and the expectations
to be formed from it (here she was tacitly thinking of Isaura wedded to
Rameau, and more than a Malibran on the stage) she insisted vehemently.
Savarin did not thus estimate Gustave Rameau, thought him a clever,
promising young writer in a very bad school of writing, who might do well
some day or other. But that a Rameau could help a Savarin to make a
fortune! No; at that idea he opened his eyes, patted his wife's
shoulder, and called her "enfant."

Graham's letter was from M. Renard, and ran thus:--

MONSIEUR,--I had the honour to call at your apartment this morning,
and I write this line to the address given to me by your concierge
to say that I have been fortunate enough to ascertain that the
relation of the missing lady is now at Paris. I shall hold myself
in readiness to attend your summons. Deign to accept, Monsieur, the
assurance of my profound consideration.
J. RENARD.

This communication sufficed to put Graham into very high spirits.
Anything that promised success to his research seemed to deliver his
thoughts from a burden and his will from a fetter. Perhaps in a few days
he might frankly and honourably say to Isaura words which would justify
his retaining longer, and pressing more ardently, the delicate hand which
trembled in his as they took leave.

On arriving at Paris, Graham despatched a note to M. Renard requesting to
see him, and received a brief line in reply that M. Renard feared he
should be detained on other and important business till the evening, but
hoped to call at eight o'clock. A few minutes before that hour he
entered Graham's apartment.

"You have discovered the uncle of Louise Duval!" exclaimed Graham; "of
course you mean M. de Mauleon, and he is at Paris?"

"True so far, Monsieur; but do not be too sanguine as to the results of
the information I can give you. Permit me, as briefly as possible, to
state the circumstances. When you acquainted me with the fact that M. de
Mauleon was the uncle of Louise Duval, I told you that I was not without
hopes of finding him out, though so long absent from Paris. I will now
explain why. Some months ago, one of my colleagues engaged in the
political department (which I am not) was sent to Lyons, in consequence
of some suspicions conceived by the loyal authorities there of a plot
against the emperor's life. The suspicions were groundless, the plot a
mare's nest. But my colleague's attention was especially drawn towards a
man not mixed up with the circumstances from which a plot had been
inferred, but deemed in some way or other a dangerous enemy to the
Government. Ostensibly, he exercised a modest and small calling as a
sort of courtier or _agent de change_; but it was noticed that certain
persons familiarly frequenting his apartment, or to whose houses he used
to go at night, were disaffected to the Government,--not by any means of
the lowest rank,--some of them rich malcontents who had been devoted
Orleanists; others, disappointed aspirants to office or the 'cross;' one
or two well-born and opulent fanatics dreaming of another Republic.
Certain very able articles in the journals of the excitable _Midi_,
though bearing another signature, were composed or dictated by this man,
--articles evading the censure and penalties of the law, but very
mischievous in their tone. All who had come into familiar communication
with this person were impressed with a sense of his powers; and also with
a vague belief that he belonged to a higher class in breeding and
education than that of a petty _agent de change_. My colleague set
himself to watch the man, and took occasions of business at his little
office to enter into talk with him. Not by personal appearance, but by
voice, he came to a conclusion that the man was not wholly a stranger to
him,--a peculiar voice with a slight Norman breadth of pronunciation,
though a Parisian accent; a voice very low, yet very distinct; very
masculine, yet very gentle. My colleague was puzzled till late one
evening he observed the man coming out of the house of one of these rich
malcontents, the rich malcontent himself accompanying him. My colleague,
availing himself of the dimness of light, as the two passed into a lane
which led to the agent's apartment, contrived to keep close behind and
listen to their conversation; but of this he heard nothing,--only, when
at the end of the lane, the rich man turned abruptly, shook his companion
warmly by the hand, and parted from him, saying, 'Never fear; all shall
go right with you, my dear Victor.' At the sound of that name 'Victor,'
my colleague's memories, before so confused, became instantaneously
clear. Previous to entering our service, he had been in the horse
business, a votary of the turf; as such he had often seen the brilliant
'sportman,' Victor de Mauleon; sometimes talked to him. Yes, that was
the voice,--the slight Norman intonation (Victor de Mauleon's father had
it strongly, and Victor had passed some of his early childhood in
Normandy), the subdued modulation of speech which had made so polite the
offence to men, or so winning the courtship to women,--that was Victor de
Mauleon. But why there in that disguise? What was his real business and
object? My confrere had no time allowed to him to prosecute such
inquiries. Whether Victor or the rich malcontent had observed him at
their heels, and feared he might have overheard their words, I know not;
but the next day appeared in one of the popular journals circulating
among the _ouvriers_ a paragraph stating that a Paris spy had been seen
at Lyons, warning all honest men against his machinations, and containing
a tolerably accurate description of his person. And that very day, on
venturing forth, my estimable colleague suddenly found himself hustled by
a ferocious throng, from whose hands he was with great difficulty rescued
by the municipal guard. He left Lyons that night; and for recompense of
his services received a sharp reprimand from his chief. He had committed
the worst offence in our profession, _trop de zele_. Having only heard
the outlines of this story from another, I repaired to my _confrere_
after my last interview with Monsieur, and learned what I now tell you
from his own lips. As he was not in my branch of the service, I could
not order him to return to Lyons; and I doubt whether his chief would
have allowed it. But I went to Lyons myself, and there ascertained that
our supposed Vicomte had left that town for Paris some months ago, not
long after the adventure of my colleague. The man bore a very good
character generally,--was said to be very honest and inoffensive; and the
notice taken of him by persons of higher rank was attributed generally to
a respect for his talents, and not on account of any sympathy in
political opinions. I found that the confrere mentioned, and who alone
could identify M. de Mauleon in the disguise which the Vicomte had
assumed, was absent on one of those missions abroad in which he is
chiefly employed. I had to wait for his return, and it was only the day
before yesterday that I obtained the following particulars. M. de
Mauleon bears the same name as he did at Lyons,--that name is Jean
Lebeau; he exercises the ostensible profession of a 'letter-writer,' and
a sort of adviser on business among the workmen and petty bourgeoisie,
and he nightly frequents the cafe Jean Jacques, Rue Faubourg Montmartre.
It is not yet quite half-past eight, and, no doubt, you could see him at
the cafe this very night, if you thought proper to go."

"Excellent! I will go! Describe him!"

"Alas! that is exactly what I cannot do at present; for after hearing
what I now tell you, I put the same request you do to my colleague, when,
before he could answer me, he was summoned to the bureau of his chief,
promising to return and give me the requisite description. He did not
return; and I find that he was compelled, on quitting his chief, to seize
the first train starting for Lille upon an important political
investigation which brooked no delay. He will be back in a few days,
and then Monsieur shall have the description."

"Nay; I think I will seize time by the forelock, and try my chance
tonight. If the man be really a conspirator, and it looks likely enough,
who knows but what he may see quick reason to take alarm and vanish from
Paris at any hour?--Cafe Jean Jacques, Rue ------; I will go. Stay; you
have seen Victor de Mauleon in his youth: what was he like then?"

"Tall, slender, but broad-shouldered, very erect, carrying his head high,
a profusion of dark curls, a small black mustache, fair clear complexion,
light-coloured eyes with dark lashes, _fort bel homme_. But he will not
look like that now."

"His present age?"

"Forty-seven or forty-eight. But before you go, I must beg you to
consider well what you are about. It is evident that M. de Mauleon has
some strong reason, whatever it be, for merging his identity in that of
Jean Lebeau. I presume, therefore, that you could scarcely go up to M.
Lebeau, when you have discovered him, and say, 'Pray, Monsieur le
Vicomte, can you give me some tidings of your niece, Louise Duval?' If
you thus accosted him, you might possibly bring some danger on yourself,
but you would certainly gain no information from him."

"True."

On the other hand, if you make his acquaintance as M. Lebeau, how can you
assume him to know anything about Louise Duval?"

"Parbleu! Monsieur Renard, you try to toss me aside on both horns of the
dilemma; but it seems to me that, if I once make his acquaintance as M.
Lebeau, I might gradually and cautiously feel my way as to the best mode
of putting the question to which I seek reply. I suppose, too, that the
man must be in very poor circumstances to adopt so humble a calling, and
that a small sum of money may smooth all difficulties."

"I am not so sure of that," said M. Renard, thoughtfully; "but grant that
money may do so, and grant also that the Vicomte, being a needy man, has
become a very unscrupulous one,--is there anything in your motives for
discovering Louise Duval which might occasion you trouble and annoyance,
if it were divined by a needy and unscrupulous man; anything which might
give him a power of threat or exaction? Mind, I am not asking you to
tell me any secret you have reasons for concealing, but I suggest that it
might be prudent if you did not let M. Lebeau know your real name and
rank; if, in short, you could follow his example, and adopt a disguise.
But no; when I think of it, you would doubtless be so unpractised in the
art of disguise that he would detect you at once to be other than you
seem; and if suspecting you of spying into his secrets, and if those
secrets be really of a political nature, your very life might not be
safe."

"Thank you for your hint; the disguise is an excellent idea, and combines
amusement with precaution. That this Victor de Mauleon must be a very
unprincipled and dangerous man is, I think, abundantly clear. Granting
that he was innocent of all design of robbery in the affair of the
jewels, still, the offence which he did own--that of admitting himself at
night by a false key into the rooms of a wife, whom he sought to surprise
or terrify into dishonour--was a villanous action; and his present course
of life is sufficiently mysterious to warrant the most unfavourable
supposition. Besides, there is another motive for concealing my name
from him: you say that he once had a duel with a Vane, who was very
probably my father, and I have no wish to expose myself to the chance of
his turning up in London some day, and seeking to renew there the
acquaintance that I had courted at Paris. As for my skill in playing any
part I may assume, do not fear; I am no novice in that. In my younger
days I was thought clever in private theatricals, especially in the
transformations of appearance which belong to light comedy and farce.
Wait a few minutes, and you shall see."

Graham then retreated into his bedroom, and in a few minutes reappeared
so changed, that Renard at first glance took him for a stranger. He had
doffed his dress--which habitually, when in Capitals, was characterized
by the quiet, indefinable elegance that to a man of the great world,
high-bred and young, seems "to the manner born"--for one of those coarse
suits which Englishmen are wont to wear in their travels, and by which
they are represented in French or German caricatures,--loose jacket of
tweed with redundant pockets, waistcoat to match, short dust-coloured
trousers. He had combed his hair straight over his forehead, which, as I
have said somewhere before, appeared in itself to alter the character of
his countenance, and, without any resort to paints or cosmetics, had
somehow or other given to the expression of his face an impudent, low-
bred expression, with a glass screwed on to his right eye,--such a look
as a cockney journeyman, wishing to pass for a "swell" about town, may
cast on a servant-maid in the pit of a suburban theatre.

"Will it do, old fellow?" he exclaimed, in a rollicking, swaggering tone
of voice, speaking French with a villanous British accent.

"Perfectly," said Renard, laughing. "I offer my compliments, and if ever
you are ruined, Monsieur, I will promise you a place in our police. Only
one caution,--take care not to overdo your part."

"Right. A quarter to nine; I'm off."

CHAPTER VI.

There is generally a brisk exhilaration of spirits in the return to any
special amusement or light accomplishment associated with the pleasant
memories of earlier youth; and remarkably so, I believe, when the
amusement or accomplishment has been that of the amateur stage-player.
Certainly I have known persons of very grave pursuits, of very dignified
character and position, who seem to regain the vivacity of boyhood when
disguising look and voice for a part in some drawing-room comedy or
charade. I might name statesmen of solemn repute rejoicing to raise and
to join in a laugh at their expense in such travesty of their habitual
selves.

The reader must not therefore be surprised, nor, I trust, deem it
inconsistent with the more serious attributes of Graham's character, if
the Englishman felt the sort of joyful excitement I describe, as, in his
way to the cafe Jean Jacques, he meditated the role he had undertaken;
and the joyousness was heightened beyond the mere holiday sense of
humouristic pleasantry by the sanguine hope that much to effect his
lasting happiness might result from the success of the object for which
his disguise was assumed.

It was just twenty minutes past nine when he arrived at the cafe Jean
Jacques. He dismissed the _fiacre_ and entered.

The apartment devoted to customers comprised two large rooms. The first
was the cafe properly speaking; the second, opening on it, was the
billiard-room. Conjecturing that he should probably find the person of
whom he was in quest employed at the billiard-table, Graham passed
thither at once. A tall man, who might be seven-and-forty, with a long
black beard, slightly grizzled, was at play with a young man of perhaps
twenty-eight, who gave him odds,--as better players of twenty-eight ought
to give odds to a player, though originally of equal force, whose eye is
not so quick, whose hand is not so steady, as they were twenty years ago.
Said Graham to himself, "The bearded man is my Vicomte." He called for a
cup of coffee, and seated himself on a bench at the end of the room.

The bearded man was far behind in the game. It was his turn to play;
the balls were placed in the most awkward position for him. Graham
himself was a fair billiard-player, both in the English and the French
game. He said to himself, "No man who can make a cannon there should
accept odds." The bearded man made a cannon; the bearded man continued
to make cannons; the bearded man did not stop till he had won the game.
The gallery of spectators was enthusiastic. Taking care to speak in
very bad, very English-French, Graham expressed to one of the
enthusiasts seated beside him his admiration of the bearded man's
playing, and ventured to ask if the bearded man were a professional
or an amateur player.

"Monsieur," replied the enthusiast, taking a short cutty-pipe from his
mouth, "it is an amateur, who has been a great player in his day, and is
so proud that he always takes less odds than he ought of a younger man.
It is not once in a month that he comes out as he has done to-night; but
to-night he has steadied his hand. He has had six petits verres."

"Ah, indeed! Do you know his name?"

"I should think so: he buried my father, my two aunts, and my wife."

"Buried?" said Graham, more and more British in his accent; "I don't
understand."

"Monsieur, you are English."

"I confess it."

"And a stranger to the Faubourg Montmartre."

"True."

"Or you would have heard of M. Giraud, the liveliest member of the State
Company for conducting funerals. They are going to play La Poule."

Much disconcerted, Graham retreated into the cafe, and seated himself
haphazard at one of the small tables. Glancing round the room, he saw no
one in whom he could conjecture the once brilliant Vicomte.

The company appeared to him sufficiently decent, and especially what may
be called local. There were some blouses drinking wine, no doubt of the
cheapest and thinnest; some in rough, coarse dresses, drinking beer.
These were evidently English, Belgian, or German artisans. At one table,
four young men, who looked like small journeymen, were playing cards.
At three other tables, men older, better dressed, probably shop-keepers,
were playing dominos. Graham scrutinized these last, but among them all
could detect no one corresponding to his ideal of the Vicomte de Mauleon.
"Probably," thought he, "I am too late, or perhaps he will not be here
this evening. At all events, I will wait a quarter of an hour." Then,
the _garcon_ approaching his table, he deemed it necessary to call for
something, and, still in strong English accent, asked for lemonade and an
evening journal. The _garcon_ nodded and went his way. A monsieur at
the round table next his own politely handed to him the "Galignani,"
saying in very good English, though unmistakably the good English of a
Frenchman, "The English journal, at your service."

Graham bowed his head, accepted the "Galignani," and inspected his
courteous neighbour. A more respectable-looking man no Englishman could
see in an English country town. He wore an unpretending flaxen wig, with
limp whiskers that met at the chin, and might originally have been the
same colour as the wig, but were now of a pale gray,--no beard, no
mustache. He was dressed with the scrupulous cleanliness of a sober
citizen,--a high white neckcloth, with a large old-fashioned pin,
containing a little knot of hair covered with glass or crystal, and
bordered with a black framework, in which were inscribed letters,--
evidently a mourning pin, hallowed to the memory of lost spouse or child,
--a man who, in England, might be the mayor of a cathedral town, at least
the town-clerk. He seemed suffering from some infirmity of vision, for
he wore green spectacles. The expression of his face was very mild and
gentle; apparently he was about sixty years old,--somewhat more.

Graham took kindly to his neighbour, insomuch that, in return for the
"Galignani," he offered him a cigar, lighting one himself.

His neighbour refused politely.

"Merci! I never smoke, never; _mon medecin_ forbids it. If I could be
tempted, it would be by, an English cigar. Ah, how you English beat us
in all things,--your ships, your iron, your tabac,--which you do not
grow!"

This speech rendered literally as we now render it may give the idea of a
somewhat vulgar speaker. But there was something in the man's manner, in
his smile, in his courtesy, which did not strike Graham as vulgar; on the
contrary, he thought within himself, "How instinctive to all Frenchmen
good breeding is!"

Before, however, Graham had time to explain to his amiable neighbour the
politico-economical principle according to which England, growing no
tobacco, had tobacco much better than France, which did grow it, a rosy
middle-aged monsieur made his appearance, saying hurriedly to Graham's
neighbour, "I'm afraid I'm late, but there is still a good half-hour
before us if you will give me my revenge."

"Willingly, Monsieur Georges. _Garcon_, the dominos."

"Have you been playing at billiards?" asked M. Georges.

"Yes, two games."

"With success?"

"I won the first, and lost the second through the defect of my eyesight;
the game depended on a stroke which would have been easy to an infant,--
I missed it."

Here the dominos arrived, and M. Georges began shuffling them; the other
turned to Graham and asked politely if he understood the game.

"A little, but not enough to comprehend why it is said to require so much
skill."

"It is chiefly an affair of memory with me; but M. Georges, my opponent,
has the talent of combination, which I have not."

"Nevertheless," replied M. Georges, gruffly, "you are not easily beaten;
it is for you to play first, Monsieur Lebeau." Graham almost started.
Was it possible! This mild, limp-whiskered, flaxen-wigged man Victor de
Mauleon, the Don Juan of his time; the last person in the room he should
have guessed. Yet, now examining his neighbour with more attentive eye,
he wondered at his stupidity in not having recognized at once the
ci-devant _gentilhomme_ and _beau garcon_. It happens frequently that
our imagination plays us this trick; we form to ourselves an idea of some
one eminent for good or for evil,--a poet, a statesman, a general, a
murderer, a swindler, a thief. The man is before us, and our ideas have
gone into so different a groove that he does not excite a suspicion; we
are told who he is, and immediately detect a thousand things that ought
to have proved his identity.

Looking thus again with rectified vision at the false Lebeau, Graham
observed an elegance and delicacy of feature which might, in youth, have
made the countenance very handsome, and rendered it still good-looking,
nay, prepossessing. He now noticed, too, the slight Norman accent, its
native harshness of breadth subdued into the modulated tones which
bespoke the habits of polished society. Above all, as M. Lebeau moved
his dominos with one hand, not shielding his pieces with the other (as M.
Georges warily did), but allowing it to rest carelessly on the table, he
detected the hands of the French aristocrat,--hands that had never done
work; never (like those of the English noble of equal birth) been
embrowned or freckled, or roughened or enlarged by early practice in
athletic sports; but hands seldom seen save in the higher circles of
Parisian life,--partly perhaps of hereditary formation, partly owing
their texture to great care begun in early youth, and continued
mechanically in after life,--with long taper fingers and polished nails;
white and delicate as those of a woman, but not slight, not feeble;
nervous and sinewy as those of a practised swordsman.

Graham watched the play, and Lebeau good-naturedly explained to him its
complications as it proceeded; though the explanation, diligently
attended to by M. Georges, lost Lebeau the game.

The dominos were again shuffled, and during that operation M. Georges
said, "By the way, Monsieur Lebeau, you promised to find me a _locataire_
for my second floor; have you succeeded?"

"Not yet. Perhaps you had better advertise in 'Les Petites Affiches.'
You ask too much for the habitues of this neighbourhood,--one hundred
francs a month."

"But the lodging is furnished, and well too, and has four rooms. One
hundred francs are not much."

A thought flashed upon Graham. "Pardon, Monsieur," he said, "have you an
_appartement de garcon_ to let furnished?"

"Yes, Monsieur, a charming one. Are you in search of an apartment?"

"I have some idea of taking one, but only by the month. I am but just
arrived at Paris, and I have business which may keep me here a few weeks.
I do but require a bedroom and a small cabinet, and the rent must be
modest. I am not a milord."

"I am sure we could arrange, Monsieur," said M. Georges, "though I could
not well divide my logement. But one hundred francs a month is not
much!"

"I fear it is more than I can afford; however, if you will give me your
address, I will call and see the rooms,--say the day after to-morrow.
Between this and then, I expect letters which may more clearly decide my
movements."

"If the apartments suit you," said M. Lebeau, "you will at least be in
the house of a very honest man, which is more than can be said of every
one who lets furnished apartments. The house, too, has a concierge, with
a handy wife who will arrange your rooms and provide you with coffee--or
tea, which you English prefer--if you breakfast at home." Here M.
Georges handed a card to Graham, and asked what hour he would call.

"About twelve, if that hour is convenient," said Graham, rising. "I
presume there is a restaurant in the neighbourhood where I could dine
reasonably."

"_Je crois bien_, half-a-dozen. I can recommend to you one where you can
dine _en prince_ for thirty sous. And if you are at Paris on business,
and want any letters written in private, I can also recommend to you my
friend here, M. Lebeau. Ay, and on affairs his advice is as good as a
lawyer's, and his fee a bagatelle."

"Don't believe all that Monsieur Georges so flatteringly says of me," put
in M. Lebeau, with a modest half-smile, and in English. "I should tell
you that I, like yourself, am recently arrived at Paris, having bought
the business and goodwill of my predecessor in the apartment I occupy;
and it is only to the respect due to his antecedents, and on the score of
a few letters of recommendation which I bring from Lyons, that I can
attribute the confidence shown to me, a stranger in this neighbourhood.
Still I have some knowledge of the world, and I am always glad if I can
be of service to the English. I love the English"--he said this with a
sort of melancholy earnestness which seemed sincere; and then added in a
more careless tone,--"I have met with much kindness from them in the
course of a chequered life."

"You seem a very good fellow,--in fact, a regular trump, Monsieur
Lebeau," replied Graham, in the same language. "Give me your address.
To say truth, I am a very poor French scholar, as you must have seen, and
am awfully bother-headed how to manage some correspondence on matters
with which I am entrusted by my employer, so that it is a lucky chance
which has brought me acquainted with you."

M. Lebeau inclined his head gracefully, and drew from a very neat morocco
case a card, which Graham took and pocketed. Then he paid for his coffee
and lemonade, and returned home well satisfied with the evening's
adventure.

CHAPTER VII.

The next morning Graham sent for M. Renard, and consulted with that
experienced functionary as to the details of the plan of action which he
had revolved during the hours of a sleepless night.

"In conformity with your advice," said he, "not to expose myself to the
chance of future annoyance, by confiding to a man so dangerous as the
false Lebeau my name and address, I propose to take the lodging offered
to me, as Mr. Lamb, an attorney's clerk, commissioned to get in certain
debts, and transact other matters of business, on behalf of his
employer's clients. I suppose there will be no difficulty with the
police in this change of name, now that passports for the English are not
necessary?"

"Certainly not. You will have no trouble in that respect."

"I shall thus be enabled very naturally to improve acquaintance with the
professional letter-writer, and find an easy opportunity to introduce the
name of Louise Duval. My chief difficulty, I fear, not being a practical
actor, will be